Studies in Centrifugal Motion
by Talye Kendrin
Summary: The study group meets a young nurse at a blood typing clinic at the college. Over time, they learn things about her, both interesting and just plain weird. Abed/OC, updated Mondays. Story starts towards end of season 2, works up to the end of season 3.
1. Free

_"Good morning, Greendale! Don't forget to stop by the blood-typing clinic today to find out your blood type. You never know, you might find it's...A positive...experience! ...Get it? A positive? ...No?"_

"Am I the only one who finds the dean's jokes to be getting progressively worse as the year goes by?" Jeff said, not looking up from his phone even as he spoke.

"More importantly, who all doesn't know their blood type?" Annie asked, leaning forward with an excited grin. "I think we should all meet up at the clinic after our women's study class, and then when they come back for the blood donation clinic in two weeks we can all go and give blood! After all, it's for a good cause. Did you know that a single donation can be used for a number of different patients?"

"Whoa there, cowgirl. I think you're letting the horse get away from you, if you know what I mean," Pierce said. The group simultaneously fixed him with a blank stare. "...What?"

Troy shook his head. "Pierce, no one knows what you mean." He shrugged. "I can come with you guys to the blood-typing clinic, but I won't be able to donate blood...Jehovah's Witness and all. We don't believe in blood transfusions, just like we don't believe in birthdays."

"Oh, I think that's a great idea, Annie. So? Are we all going?" Shirley said, looking around at everyone as they mumbled their consent.

"Great! See you all there!" Annie said with a grin, and everyone started packing up their things for their first class.

Troy and Abed walked side-by-side towards class, Troy with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"I wonder if there'll be any hot nurses at the clinic..." he said.

"Statistics say probably not," Abed stated, noting Troy's somewhat deflated look, "...but one can hope."

* * *

"Sophie, why don't you take a break for a bit and stretch your legs?" April said with a kindly smile. "The next break between classes won't be a few minutes yet, so I can hold down the fort until then."

I grinned at the older woman. "Thanks, April. I'll be back in a bit, then. Want me to grab you some coffee while I'm up?"

"Ooh, hot chocolate actually, if you can find any."

I laughed. "Challenge accepted! Be right back."

It didn't take long for me to find a coffee vending machine, which also had hot chocolate. I bought one for April and got a mocha for myself before heading back to the table we had been at in the college's gymnasium, noticing that students were starting to roam the halls now. Shaking my head, I picked up the pace a bit, careful not to spill either drink.

When I got back to the gym, there were some people already there, and a few more entering the gym from the other entrance on the opposite side.

"Perfect timing, Sophie," April said with a wink.

I chuckled. "Come on, April, have I ever given you reason to doubt me?"

"Not yet...and hopefully you'll keep it that way, right?" April joked.

"Oh ye of little faith," I gave a fake disappointed sigh. "Nevertheless. I can help someone over here," I said, taking my seat next to April after having placed their drinks where we wouldn't knock them over.

"Come on, Britta. Shirley and I already know our blood types because we're blood donors," a sweet-faced brunette girl said, shoving a girl with slightly curled blond hair forward.

"Hi there," I said with a friendly smile. "Thanks for coming. Could you give me one of your hands, please?"

"Um...does it matter which one?" the girl said, looking sort of awkward.

"Not at all. If you'd rather I use your non-dominant hand, I can do that, for sure."

"That'd be good," the blond replied, placing her left hand on the table.

"Alright, I just have to disinfect the spot I'm going to use and let the disinfectant dry completely," I said as I rubbed an alcohol swab all over the end of the girl's middle finger. "My name's Sophie, by the way. What's yours?"

"Oh...Britta. And this is Annie and Shirley," she said, motioning to the two women behind her with her free hand.

"Nice to meet you all," I said. "I would shake all your hands, but..." I gave a pointed look at where I was holding Britta's finger still while waiting for the alcohol to dry.

"Nice to meet you," Shirley said. She seemed friendly; I took an immediate liking to her. "How long have you been a nurse?"

"A year now, not counting my time as a student nurse," I replied as I got out the needle to prick Britta's finger. "You're going to feel a bit of a pinch," I warned before clicking the needle down and tossing it in the sharps container, squeezing the finger around the pricked area to draw up enough blood to take a sample. Slipping the sample into the machine, I sat back as it analyzed it.

"Oh, that's nice," Shirley said. "I didn't think you looked past your mid-twenties, but you never know with some people."

"True enough," I said, noticing more people coming to join the group of friends, this time a group of men. "I know my sister is turning thirty next year, and she doesn't look a day over twenty-one, so I'm only hoping I got those genes, too." I flashed the girls a cheeky grin. "And you, miss Britta, are the proud owner of type B positive blood. Congratulations," I said with a wink.

"Oh. Is that...rare?" she said.

"Mmm...about nine percent of people are B positive, so relatively, yes. The most common blood types are A and O positive. It's more common to have a positive Rh factor than it is to have a negative one."

"O...kay," she said.

I grinned sheepishly. "Sorry. I tend to overdo it when it comes to divulging information. I figure it's always better to tell people more about their health status and whatnot than they ask rather than not enough and have a potential lawsuit on your hands. Health care can be a rather touchy subject to deal with."

"Oh, no problem. I just doubt I'll be able to remember ninety percent of what you just told me five minutes from now," she said with a shrug.

"I don't expect you to. But hey, it's college, you have more important things to cram in your brain instead, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," she said, grabbing her messenger bag off the floor next to her chair and moving to let the next person sit down. "Thanks," she smiled.

"No problem. Hope to see you at the donation clinic next week!" I waved at her, receiving a wave in response from all three women as they left. I focused on the chair in front of me as the next person sat down and smiled.

"Hi, I'm Sophie. What's your name?"

The guy sitting across from me didn't smile in return, but he didn't seem unfriendly as he said, "Abed. Nice to meet you. My friend and I didn't expect there to be any attractive young nurses here today. I'm glad we were wrong."

I laughed, flattered. Guys weren't usually that straight-forward, and when they were, they often tended to be a little creepy, or were kind of gross. Thankfully, this guy didn't seem to be either of those things. "Well, thank you, Abed. You must be quite the lady-killer. In the figurative sense, of course," I said with a wink before requesting his hand for the testing.

"Thanks. Out of curiosity, which of the six Star Wars movies is your favorite?"

"Well, I don't particularly like spreading the success of the original three over the later prequel films. Mostly I find they're just fun to make fun of, sort of like the Twilight saga. And I would say, as is almost always the case, I prefer the first film the best being where it all started, so A New Hope."

"Cool. Coolcoolcool. Favorite film?"

I sucked air in through my teeth. "Ouch. Hard question-this might pinch a bit," I said as I brought the needle out. "I have a lot, but if I had to pick one, I would probably say Tron-the original, that is-for its creative universe and being the first film to combine live-action with computer graphics. It's a good film in its own right, but those things just make it epic."

"Awesome. What are your thoughts on Batman?"

"It's the only universe I collect comics from. Batman, Batgirl, Batwoman, Batman and Robin. And The Dark Knight is amazing. I'm excited for The Dark Knight Rises, but at the same time I'm really hesitant, because I'm just not sure how they could possibly top Heath Ledger as The Joker," I sighed, taking the sample and bandaging his finger, inserting the sample in the machine and feeling a twinge of self-consciousness as I realized I was talking about myself a lot without keeping the conversation going both ways. However, Abed was asking questions in such a rapid succession that it felt impossible to ask any questions about him without cutting him off, and I didn't want to be rude. (Also, it felt kind of nice that he seemed so interested in what I was interested in. So sue me, it puffed up my ego a bit. Besides, it's hard to make friends when you're working in health care, what with seeing people when they're at their worst and all.)

"You have a point there." He inclined his head in my direction. "On a scale of one to ten, how nerdy would you say you and/or your hobbies are?"

"Hmm...about an eight," I admitted. "I'm sure there are people nerdier than I am, but I do have a lot of closet-nerd hobbies."

"Such as?"

Wouldn't you like to know, I thought, but answered before I could convince myself to dodge the question, "Cosplay. LARPing. Magic: The Gathering."

"Cool. Coolcoolcool."

I could feel that my face was a little warm and I hoped I wasn't blushing (probably pointlessly). "Well, sir Abed, your blood type is officially type AB positive, which makes you a universal recipient."

"Oh, I already knew that. I just wanted an excuse to talk to you."

If I wasn't blushing before, I was definitely blushing then. I laughed. "Well, then. Mission accomplished."

"Not quite. My friend Troy and I are pretty nerdy, and seeing as you are too, I think the three of us should hang out sometime, so I'm going to give you my number. I only have a limited number of minutes per month, though, so I prefer texting," he said as he drew a piece of paper out of his sleeve (which I will admit I thought was a bit of an odd place to put it) and took a pen from the breast pocket on his flannel overshirt to jot down his number with.

"No problem. I have a pay-as-you-go plan, so I usually just buy a bundle of texts rather than calling anyways."

"Perfect. See ya," he said with a little salute before walking off.

I waved after him, sort of disappointed he couldn't stay longer, but mentally reprimanded myself, noting the fact that I was still at work. Just because I was working with the blood donation clinic that day didn't mean I could slack off. Just because it was a more welcoming setting didn't mean I could just chat with certain people while ignoring my duties. I took being a nurse quite seriously. I was proud of my job, and I did not want anyone to think I wasn't.

"I can help whoever's next," I said, continuing on with my duties as I pointedly ignored the scrap of paper now stuffed in the pocket of my white lab coat.

"Hi, I'm Jeff," a guy who looked to be in his early-to-mid thirties plopped down in the seat before me, and I motioned for his hand. He complied, flashing a mildly smug-looking grin. "I hope my friend there didn't creep you out much. He can be a bit awkward when it comes to meeting new people."

The fact that he was mildly insulting one of his so-called friends immediately set me on guard, what with my being a very loyal person. I didn't have many good friends, but the ones that I did have I would never insult, even as mildly as that, unless it was to their face and they knew I was joking.

"Hmm, well, I think you're actually making me feel more awkward than he did. After all, he didn't insult anyone within the first thirty seconds of introducing himself." I shook my head. "From what I've seen of you so far, I think you and my sister would be perfect for each other."

He seemed to study my face for a minute before he finally said, "Wait...that's why I thought your face looked familiar. Are you by any chance related to Amber Lynn Tanners?"

"Yup. That would be my sister," I replied straight-faced. Usually when people found out that my older sister was a model, they went crazy trying to get me to get her autograph or phone number or even a lock of her hair (some people were just plain creepy about it) for them. I never lied to them about being her sister, though, because if they knew my full name then they could just read pretty much any of the tabloid interviews with her and find out I was the sister she often spoke of, anyways. No point lying about it when they'd just find out the truth later, I figured.

"Whoa. Why are you a nurse when you could probably use her connections to get into modeling? You could literally get paid to look good."

Hm. Certainly not the reaction to my being related to a 'celebrity' that I usually got and/or expected. I raised an eyebrow at him as I drew the necessary blood for sampling and bandaged Jeff's finger, inserting the sample into the machine. "I would think that it's pretty obvious. Despite that modeling can pay pretty well if you get enough gigs, nursing still pays the bills, the work is a lot steadier, and personally, I find it a lot more rewarding because despite the terrible hours you usually end up working, you're actually helping people who really need it, unlike with modeling, where the only way to help people is by using your paycheck."

Jeff sighed. "Point taken. But personally, I would never want to do what you do, because nurses have to deal with people's shit, both figuratively _and _literally."

I laughed. "True enough. But once you get past that, it's really rewarding work. Stressful, but rewarding. I find working part-time with the blood donation clinic can be a nice change of pace from the hospital, though."

"Oh? Do you work at Riverside General?"

"Yessiree Bob."

He snapped his fingers. "Aha! So your relation to Amber Lynn Tanners wasn't the only reason you looked familiar. You must've been at the hospital when my friend Pierce was fake-dying."

"Oh, Pierce Hawthorne?" I grinned. I remembered that guy, for sure. He had hit on every nurse (or made gay insinuations, in the case of the male nurses) to the point where everyone had pretty much refused to go into his room, with the exception of myself and a couple of other nurses that were assertive enough to tell Pierce that we did not appreciate his affections and asked him to please keep his comments to himself while we were around so that we could deliver care in a professional manner. He was actually quite civil after that, and seemed to grow fond of those of us that thought to go that route with him. After he stopped trying to hit on me, I actually thought him an amusing older man, when he wasn't making racist jokes. I had met his father when he had stopped in the one time, though, and that quickly made me appreciate how mild Pierce's racism was in comparison. "Oh! That must've been Abed that was making that documentary then."

"Yeah, that would've been him. How did you even deal with him? I'm his friend, and even I don't like him half the time." He smirked. "Well, maybe more than half the time."

I snorted. "Oh believe me, compared to some of the patients I've had to deal with, Pierce is just a great big, if not slightly racist, teddy bear."

"Slightly?" He gave me a weird look.

"Have you met the guy's father?" I asked, eyebrows raised.

"Um...no. Should I have?"

"Oh God no. Pray you never do, either." I looked over at the machine. "Oh, congratulations! You're type O negative, the universal donor." I grinned. "So hopefully you'll come to the blood donation clinic next week. We can always use O negative, after all."

"Well, I'll probably be there whether I like it or not, since my study group will drag me there like they did today."

I smirked. "Funny, I don't see a collar and leash around your neck."

"Oh, ha ha," he said, standing up and grabbing his bag. "I was speaking figuratively, smartass."

"That's miss smartass to you. See you next week!" I said, shooing him off as he waved and walked off.

I grinned to myself. Well, at least I was meeting new people around my age today, if nothing else. I looked to the small line-up on the other side of the table.

"I can help the next person here."

* * *

**A/N:** This story is my project for NaNoWriMo, so you can bet there will be updates every week for a while yet. Feedback would be much appreciated; seeing as I didn't start this project until a couple days ago (it wouldn't leave me alone; I hadn't been planning on doing NaNoWriMo before this) none of this is really edited, so if you see a mistake, let me know.


	2. Oh, What A Thing

**Chapter Two**_  
_

**"OH, WHAT A THING"  
**

* * *

_Anime may be a lot more visually appealing because you watch it on TV instead of reading the original manga, but I find that often the manga includes a lot more plot-pertinent information than the anime, which often forces you to draw conclusions of your own about things that happened, plus anime has a lot of filler episodes-Naruto is a shining example of that. _I smirked as I sent the text off to Abed. We had been debating the pros and cons of anime versus manga through text. Whereas he was pro-anime, I was heavily pro-manga. Then again, I had always been a little bookworm, and as I had told Abed when we first met, I almost always preferred the original over any remakes, and when it came to anime and manga, the manga almost always came first, except in rare cases such as Gundam SEED.

My phone buzzed, and I clicked to open up the new text.

**True, but sometimes it's nice to be able to draw your own conclusions. Sometimes you can come up with better ones than the real ones, and then it's nice to be able to pretend yours are the real ones. It can make for some interesting plot twists,** it read.

I chuckled and replied, _Sounds like fanfiction to me._

It took a moment for my phone to buzz that I got a response.

**I write a lot of those in my head, but never on paper. I think writing it on paper might take away from the whole canon experience because then I would feel like I created an alternate universe where the characters are trapped with no way to escape, and I wouldn't want to do that to them. Sidenote, what would you say to meeting up with Troy and I tomorrow? We want to go to the zoo but I feel like we should only go if you do, too. Wearing a shoulder-length seventies-style blond wig, if you have one.**

I raised my eyebrows before typing my response.

_Why yes, yes I do. Is this a movie reference? And if so, is it a comedy starring actor Will Ferrell?_ After all, we had just been discussing that movie earlier that day.

The response was almost immediate. **Yup. Is there any wig you don't have?**

I grinned. _Not that I'm aware of. And if I find one I don't have, you can bet that I won't not have it for long._

**Cool. Coolcoolcool.**

_So tomorrow it is then? I work a day shift so I'm off at three. I can meet up with you guys whenever you're done class,_ I typed.

My phone buzzed again. **We can meet at four-thirty and go out for supper afterwards if you're free.**

_I most certainly am. Until next we meet, then._

**Perhaps Until next we text, instead.**

I grinned and shook my head. _Perhaps that would be more accurate. However, seeing as I have that day shift tomorrow... Good night._

One last buzz, and the text read, **Good night. I'll be seeing you.**

I placed my phone on the nightstand and clicked off my Star Wars lamp, and was left smiling in the dark for quite some time before I was finally able to calm down enough about what the next day held to fall asleep.

* * *

My shift at work that day was hectic and stressful, being as I worked at the hospital rather than the blood donation clinic, and there were a crapload of outpatients, which was what I had been assigned to work that day rather than being assigned a specific number of inpatients. (I always found outpatients more stressful because there's often so much more of them, and rather than having charts with their patient information readily available, you had to delve into medical record files to dredge up their information and ask a butt ton of questions to make sure there wasn't anything new or undocumented that might cause complications in treatment. I mean, you still had to keep those sorts of things in mind with inpatients, but it always seemed to be more of a problem with outpatients. Maybe it was just my mindset. Anyways.)

It felt incredibly good to leave the hospital that day. I mean, it always felt satisfying to leave work because I felt like I had done good in helping people, but some days, like that one, it just felt like a godsend to be able to leave because it meant I didn't have to work another hour. Some days I would accept without complaint if they asked me if I could stay a few extra hours, but that day, if they had asked me to, I think I might have just screamed.

(Thankfully, though, they didn't. Thank God.)

When I got home, I took a quick shower to get the gross dried-sweat feeling off (the hospital always felt hot and stuffy because it was warm so that on average they wouldn't have to provide much by way of blankets, and the nurses were practically run off their feet trying to get everything done because most days were so busy), put on my Batman bathrobe and stepped into my closet to try and find something similar to the character Abed had hinted via text that I should dress like. After a few moments of contemplation, I pulled out a cream-colored, long-sleeved dress that fell just above my knees and had a slightly flared-out skirt, some nude pantyhose, a geometric print scarf, a tan leather belt, and a pair of dark brown ankle boots. Grinning at my chosen outfit, I couldn't help but thinking _I choose you, Pikachu_ as I pulled them all on. Ah, childhood.

As I passed by my vanity, I hesitated. To put make-up on, or not to put make-up on? That is the question. I didn't usually put on make-up, or when I did, it was usually just mascara and eyeliner. I was not a make-up person because I didn't usually have the patience for it. It took time to put it on, so I didn't put it on for work, and due to my unpredictable work hours, I didn't go out on the town much, usually preferring to kick back with a movie or a good book, be it with friends or by myself. (Though since I graduated from university, the trend seemed to be more and more that I spent time alone rather than with friends-a sad fact of life, for me.) Thus, when I hesitated at my vanity, I didn't dare start putting make-up on before I snuck a peek over at my alarm clock. The clock read three forty-five pm, so I took a deep breath in and let it out slowly, deciding that, in order to fully look the part, I might as well put on the goddamn make-up. Conceding to the decision, I pulled up some reference pictures on my laptop and started in on the task of painting my face, which in the end almost made me late for meeting up with Abed and Troy.

I was completely flustered by the time I pulled into the zoo parking lot, texting Abed with one hand even as I was locking my vehicle with the other.

_Sorry I'm late, where are you guys?_

Two seconds before the telltale buzz. **By the ticket booth. Meet you there.**

When the ticket booth came into sight, I couldn't help but let out a laugh. There Abed and Troy stood, dressed as Ron Burgundy and Brian Fantana, respectively, from Anchorman. They waved at me before I got any closer and I could see their lips moving as they talked to each other. I could feel my curiosity pique as to what they might be talking about (and my ego, wondering if it was about me-I found myself wondering whether I had smudged my make-up on the way over and it looked weird, but then nixed that idea because I'd been a good girl and kept both hands on the wheel at all times so I couldn't have done that). I vaguely hoped we wouldn't be out for long after we went for supper, because my wig was starting to feel a bit itchy already, and despite that I loved wigs, unless I was in costume at a convention, I usually didn't wear wigs for more than a couple hours for comfort's sake. However, another part of me hoped that we would be out until late (or what constituted as 'late' in relation to the fact that I had woken up at five-thirty in the morning in order to get ready for my shift-so about ten-thirty/eleven at night) because from the text conversations I'd had with Abed since the blood typing clinic three days ago, he seemed like a seriously cool (read: nerdy-which in my books was the equivalent of cool) cat. And with the way he had talked about Troy, they seemed like two peas in a pod.

But, I digress. I really was curious about what they were talking about. They had stopped by the time I was within hearing distance.

"I thought we could go to the zoo because let's face it, zoos are awesome, and Troy and I really like the zoo scene in Anchorman." He looked over at Troy. "Bear fight." They both did what looked like some sort of cross between a handshake and a high-five. "By the way, you look good as Veronica Corningstone."

"Yeah, try amazing and that almost describes it," Troy added.

I grinned. "Thank you. I like Veronica, she's a female rights advocate. Unlike Veronica from Archie comics."

Troy turned to stare at Abed, who responded, "Yup."

I glanced between the two, raising an eyebrow. "I feel like I'm missing something here."

"Yup," they both said. I waited for an explanation, but none came as they moved to get in line for the ticket booth.

I shook my head. _Men._

* * *

Abed, Troy, and I had fun running around the zoo in costume. I wouldn't usually have chosen to go to a zoo because, in my opinion, once you've seen one zoo you've seen pretty much all of them (super-rare species that are only found in certain zoos aside). However, the fact that we were in costume made for a lot of amusement. Some people asked us if there was some special occasion we were dressed up before, and it was amusing to see the looks they gave us when we answered that no, we just felt like it. No reason whatsoever. Then there were a couple of people that actually recognized what we were from, and one of them even asked us for a photo. (That was my favorite part of dressing up to conventions-I loved posing. So sue me for having an ego, I liked knowing that people liked my costumes. Especially since I usually made them myself.) It was fun hanging out with Abed and Troy, especially when they started telling me about their morning 'TV show' that wasn't really a TV show, but they liked psyching people out by making them think they thought it was real. Which sounded like their reasoning behind pretty much everything they did together-for the fun of it. Just like going to the zoo dressed in Anchorman costumes that day. I sighed contentedly as I pulled the car up next to the curb in front of Abed and Troy's apartment building. They had taken the bus to the zoo, so I had given them a lift to A&W for supper and offered to drive them home after (which thankfully they accepted-otherwise they would've either had to wait in the cold for the bus, or walk home through a not-so-great neighborhood).

Abed and Troy got out, but before they left, Abed leaned down to look in through the open passenger side door and said, "We had fun today. We should do it again sometime."

I grinned. "Yeah. Maybe next time we can do _Star Trek: The Next Generation_."

Abed tilted his head a bit. "Personally I prefer the original series, but I'm open to compromise. We can discuss it in text."

"Sounds good. 'Night Abed, g'night Troy!" I said, waving at Troy as he was standing behind Abed.

"Goodnight!" They chorused before Abed closed the door and they walked into the building. I couldn't help but smile as I watched them go. It was nice making new friends. It was nice just meeting new people. I realized then that I hadn't been getting as much social interaction as I needed. I was a social person by nature, which was part of why I loved going to conventions, because there were just so many people, and the environment was very friendly and open because everyone was converged in one spot to celebrate a common interest. Still smiling, I gave a short laugh and shook my head, pulling out onto the road to drive back home. Twenty-four hours wouldn't even come to pass before I texted Abed again.

* * *

"Oh Abed, what's that?" Shirley said in her cutesy tone as she tried to see the notebook he was scribbling furiously in.

"Movie quotes. I transferred a bunch of movies from my laptop to my iPod so I could start compiling a notebook full of movie quotes for future reference."

Troy quirked his head to the side. "...Wait a minute," he said, sneaking a peek at some of the quotes before Abed could stop writing and cover them. "Are those for what I think they're for?"

"Possibly. Maybe. Probably. It depends how things go. I figure I should be prepared for the best as well as the worst," he responded without pausing in his writing once.

"O...kay? Are you going to share with us what the hell you're talking about?" Britta said, looking between the two.

"Nope," they both deadpanned.

"It's Abed's business. I'm only ever-so-slightly involved in the situation and that's only through my association with him as best friend."

Annie made an offended noise. "We're Abed's friends, too, how come we don't know what you're talking about?"

"Uh, that's because you're missing the classification of _best_."

She repeated her offended noise, but made no further comment.

"Dean-a-ling!"

The group groaned as one as the dean entered the room, with the exception of Abed, who was completely focused on the movie he was watching and scribbling down quotes from.

"Oh, well that's just rude," Dean Pelton said. "I just thought I would bring you a visitor who's friends with some of your group members. Everyone, this is my niece, Sophie Tanners," he said, stepping out from in front of her.

Everyone, including Abed, was now paying attention, and staring wide-eyed.

"Wait...she's your _niece?_"

* * *

**A/N: **Thank-you to **TriadBella** for reviewing and adding this story to their favorites/watch list.

I hope it's clear in the first section which are Sophie's texts and which are Abed's texts. Originally I had just bolded them both, but then I realized that might be a little confusing for readers.

Also, cookies to whoever caught the little movie quote toward the beginning. ;D

Review! Next update is Thursday!


	3. Best I Know

**Chapter Three**

**"BEST I KNOW"  
**

* * *

"Dean, could you please leave? We would like to discuss this shocking new turn of events with our...friend," Jeff said with what I thought a rather fake, smarmy smile plastered on his face.

"Actually, I thought I might stay and-"

"_Dean!_" Jeff leveled a glare at him.

"Dean gone!" He replied, beating a hasty retreat. "See ya later Sophster!"

"See ya, Big C," I called after him. I turned to see everyone giving me either blank stares or weird looks.

"...'Big C'?" Jeff asked with a sarcastic tone.

"What? He never liked us calling him 'uncle'. Said it made him feel old. He prefers to think he's still 'young and hip'," I said, using air quotes. "And, well," I said, lowering my voice just in case he was hovering outside the room just out of sight, "I don't have the heart to correct him."

Jeff snorted. "So does that mean that 'sister' he always refers to borrowing clothes from actually exists?"

"Just as much as I do," I said, leaning back against the doorframe and shoving my hands in the pockets of my black scrub pants. "She's four years older than him, so when they were kids she used to torture him by forcing him to wear her old hand-me-downs. Over time he grew desensitized to the horror and shame it induced-defense mechanism, I guess-and then one day when they were teenagers my mom says she walked into his room without knocking and rather than catching him with dirty magazines like the typical teenage boy, she found him wearing her old figure skating costume she'd thought she lost-tights and all." I grinned.

"...Wow. That was more information on the dean than I ever wanted to know. And I can't even just not care, because the mental image it comes with is too disturbing for me to ever forget. Thanks for that," he said with heavy sarcasm, turning in his chair and going back to typing away on his phone.

"You're welcome," I said, tipping my fedora. Pushing off the doorframe, I walked over to where Abed was sitting and leaned my elbows on the back of the chair as he was sitting forward on the edge of the chair, crouched over his iPod. He had been scribbling in a notebook, but when I approached he promptly shut it and pinned the first few pages together using the lid of the pen he'd been writing with. "Whatcha writing, Abed?"

"Movie quotes. It's a personal project."

"So I take it I can't see it?"

"Nope. Noooo. Not now anyways. Maybe after it's finished."

I studied him for a moment, noticing he seemed kind of tense. "...Okay. Well, whatever you like. It's your project, after all." I flashed Troy a smile. "Howdy."

Troy grinned and touched the brim of an imaginary hat. "Howdy, ma'am."

"Ooh. Pierce, how've you been? Staying off the pills, I hope?"

"No worries, nurse, I'm clean. Unlike your complexion."

I rolled my eyes. "I told you a bunch of times, Pierce, they're _freckles_, not acne. If they were acne, I would've gotten rid of them by now."

"Oh don't do that, freckles are cute," Annie said.

"Yeah, the good Lord made you the way he intended to, no need for you to try and change," Shirley added.

I cracked a smile. "I know. I don't mind them most days, it's just that they can be really annoying when it comes to cosplay, because seriously, how many female characters can you name off the top of your head that have freckles? Aside from Pippi Longstocking," I said before Troy could speak. He deflated a bit and seemed to sulk after that.

"And that just goes to prove that society's ideals of beauty are completely unrealistic and uncompromising towards women who have naturally occurring differences in their skin pigment," Britta said with a frown.

I smiled at her. "True. Which is why rather than buy beauty magazines, I prefer to just use Youtube for tips," I said with a wink. "Anyways, I just dropped by because my mom wanted me to drop something off for Big C. I'm on my lunch break, so I have to head back to work. See you guys," I said, taking my fedora off and plopping it on Abed's head with the sneaky thinking that if he had it, I had an excuse to meet up with him the next day, when I had a day off. I quickly skipped out before anyone, including Abed, could say anything about my leaving it, and grinned to myself the entire way back to work.

_Sophie: One. Karma: Zero._

* * *

When I got home after work that day, I was ready to collapse. I had ended up staying two hours overtime because of some last-minute admissions right at the end of the shift that needed paperwork done. The nurses coming on for the evening shift appreciated my extra time so they didn't get saddled with the hassle of extra paperwork (some days it seemed that was all you did and you barely had any time to spend checking on patients, which was where nurse's aides came in handy-thank God the hospital had them or I don't think we would even get half of our work done most of the time), but it had been a hectic day as it was, and I felt like I just wanted to curl up in bed and sleep for a year. When I opened the door to my house, the first thing that I noticed was the delicious aroma of fresh baked bread and something spicy, possibly chili.

"Amber, you have no idea how much I love you right now," I called out as I closed the door behind me and chucked my shoes and coat in a heap next to the shoe rack. Who cares about putting things away neatly when your feet are aching from being on them for hours. I quickly crossed the porch area into the dining room and collapsed in one of the chairs at the table.

"You're welcome," my sister said, shooting me a grin from where she stood on the other side of the island in the kitchen, wearing my Batman apron as she stirred a pot of something on the stove. "I stopped in here at four to drop off those CDs of yours I borrowed, and when I saw you weren't back from work yet, I figured they'd got you to do overtime and you'd appreciate a nice ready-made supper when you got home. Of course, I expect payment in the form of borrowing that cute green skirt of yours on Sunday. Mom and dad are dragging me to church with them while you get to skip out because of work."

I gave an involuntary snort of laughter. "Oh come on, it's not _that_ bad, Breezy. All you have to do is look like you're paying attention when really you're thinking of what happens next in the book you have waiting for you back at home. You're reading that Keys to the Kingdom series now, right? How is it so far?"

"Oh my golly, Sophster, it is _ah-mazing_. I must lend it to you sometime. It just keeps getting better with every book."

"Well, feed me first. I won't wait to eat until you've finished raving about it. You can talk while I stuff my face. With MEAT."

"Hah, you wish. I subbed out the beef for _tofu_."

"Ughhh. As long as it's in small enough pieces that I don't bite down on a piece. Goddamn it Amber. You and your no-meat rules. Careful how much meat you deprive me of, woman, or I may just eat _you_." I pointed at her with a fake glare.

"Hey, I'm the one cooking. I could just as well not give you any," she said, shaking the spoon at me for emphasis. I let out a subdued 'meep' at that, daring not invoke her wrath lest she decide to make me stand back up and scrounge up my own food. I really preferred to sit back and let her do all the work. (It wasn't that I was no good at cooking. I did pretty well when I put the time into it. It's just that I didn't often feel like cooking because I didn't feel I had much reason to. After all, it was just me living in the house by myself. Sometimes, like that day, Amber would make a surprise stop-in if she didn't have work, but she was pretty busy recently, so I hardly ever had someone to cook for these days.)

As Amber scooped chili into bowls for each of us, she shot me a grin and said, "Sooo...how was the clinic on Monday? Meet any cute boooys?" She fluttered her eyelashes jokingly at me, making me laugh.

"Weeeell...I don't knoooow..." I dragged out the syllables, holding out for a possible bribe, not knowing if she had been baking while I was at work and unwilling to share valuable information without giving her a chance to convince me to.

She set down the bowls and utensils on the table and promptly sat, leaning towards me. "This sounds juicy. Spill it, or I'm taking the blackberry-pomegranate smoothie I made you and drinking it myself."

"Darn. I was hoping you had lava cake." I sighed. "Oh well. I _guess_ I can tell you about it anyways..." I proceeded to tell her all about Abed and Troy and their study group, and how the three of us had gone out in costume to the zoo and had a blast, and how I had not-so-subtly 'forgotten' my hat with Abed, at which point she snorted.

"Well, Sophster, I have to say... _hats off_... to you!" She said, before collapsing in a fit of giggles and snorts. And this was why my sister was a model, not an actress. That way they didn't have to try and market her ridiculous-sounding laugh. (Don't worry, I'm not saying that to be mean. She even acknowledges that herself.) I groaned and face-palmed.

"If you ever get the urge to quit modeling and be a stand-up comic, I will advise you thusly: ...Don't quit your day job."

"Ah, but what of my night job as Lord of the Dance?" She wiggled her eyebrows, knowing as well as I did her dancing skills were sadly lacking. "But anywho, back to your new little boy toy."

I squawked in disapproval, but she ignored me.

"Are you sure you want to pursue this? I mean, I realize you and him seem to really be hitting it off, but the last time you went out with someone you didn't know-and _don't_ say that you do know him, because honestly, you only met the guy four days ago-last time you did that, you know how that ended up," she said, looking at me with concerned eyes.

I tried to hold her gaze, but even now, two years after it had happened, I ended up averting my eyes after a few seconds. I was doing better, but not as well as I could be. I was quiet for a moment, contemplating why it was I was so excited and eager to turn this friendship into a relationship so quickly. It wasn't long before I reached a conclusion.

"I guess...I'm just afraid that if I _do_ take the time to think it through, that...I'll end up talking myself out of it, y'know?" I gave her a wan smile. "I'm always thinking things to death. What if I do this and this happens, or that goes wrong, or I lose the option to have gone another route, etcetera, etcetera. And Abed just...he seems like no matter if I've known him for a week or a year, he'll just be Abed, the same guy he was when I met him, the guy who's really into pop culture and thinking outside the box and just being true to himself and his friends." I paused. "And maybe...I'm just afraid that if I wait for too long...then he'll turn out not to be who I see him to be. Just like before."

Amber sighed before standing up and shuffling over to give me a hug, which I returned. "Sorry I brought it up, Soph. I just want you to think about why you feel you need this relationship. 'To thine own self be true', and all that." She drew back, a serious expression on her face as she leveled her gaze on mine. "I don't want you getting hurt again. I'm your big sister. I couldn't stop it from happening the first time, but goddamnit, I will do my best to keep it from happening again." She took a deep breath, then smiled. "Come on. The food's getting cold. Let's eat."

I smiled back at her. "Okay."

* * *

After I had thought about my actions towards Abed so far and my reasoning behind them, I felt a little ashamed of myself. I didn't want to jump into a relationship with someone just because I didn't think they would be the same after I got to know them. And besides, thinking more on that, I realized my own logic didn't make sense-after all, once I was in a relationship with them, I would get to know them anyways, and hey, better to get to know someone before you consider possibly dating them, right? Thus, shame on me for not evaluating my own logic sooner. It made me grateful to have my older sister looking out for me. We hadn't always gotten along, but now that we were both adults, we were like best friends. (Especially since I didn't get out much. But again, that's my own fault.)

It was Saturday. I could've picked up a shift at the hospital (they certainly had enough available shifts for me to do so), but I had worked every other day that week, so I told myself I had to take at least one day off, get some housework done, and give my cell phone a very wide berth so as not to be tempted to check it for texts. I hadn't checked it since I got home from work yesterday, so I was pretty sure Abed would have sent me one, but I was trying to keep myself from obsessing over him so that I wouldn't end up being that girl who jumped headfirst into a relationship without thinking anything through and ended up getting burned.

My sister was right. I needed to know myself, and to only choose what I really thought was best for myself. I wasn't usually the person who rushed headlong into things; I had only done that once, and she was right-it had ended badly.

Once I was done most of my housework, I decided to reward myself by taking a break and working on the costume I was putting together for the coming convention season. Going into my bedroom, I went to the shelving unit that was filled with wigs, smiling at my collection. I took pride in my wigs and costumes, being that I styled and sewed them all myself, respectively. (Though I'd started doing it out of necessity due to the cost of commissioning someone else to do them for me, I enjoyed the feeling of fulfillment it gave me to finish them and receive compliments for my handiwork when I wore them to conventions.) Grabbing a long, unstyled white one, I set it, wig head and all, on my craft table and dug out my scissors and layering scissors.

"Alright, handsome, time to make you Drizzt-worthy," I muttered, and set in, glancing at the reference pictures I had printed out earlier every once in a while to make sure I was doing alright.

A few minutes in, my phone buzzed. I tensed. Damnit, I forgot I hadn't actually turned it off, just set it to vibrate. So that was the odd noise I had thought I'd heard earlier. I'd been in the other room, so I'd just heard something in the distance and shrugged it off when the noise hadn't happened again. I turned my head to look at the blasted thing and was contemplating whether I should read my texts or shut it off when I thought, wait a minute. I don't want Abed-or on the off chance it's not him, whoever else-to think that I'm ignoring them. I can still take time to think about the Abed situation whether I text him or not. I just don't want to instigate things, but if he's the one texting me, that means I'm not the instigator. I'm just being polite. Logical reasoning having won out, I practically ran across the room and snatched up the phone, opening it to find—

"Seven missed text messages." I could feel my face heat up as I opened my inbox to realize that every single one of them was from Abed. "He probably thinks I'm ignoring him. Bad Sophie. Bad girl." I quickly opened the oldest one.

**You forgot your hat.**

I smiled. No, really? Next message.

**For some reason I felt like you did on purpose, though.**

Darn, and here I thought I'd been so subtle. Curse you and your intuitive powers!

**It's okay. I don't mind. It actually goes better with my Indiana Jones costume than mine does.**

Now I feel like I should make a Marion costume...

**I'm going to assume you're still at work seeing as you're not texting back. Did you have to stay for a double shift?**

Nope. But looking at the timestamp on the text, it was just before I got off from my two hours overtime. Next.

**Want to watch Cougar Town with me? They're showing a rerun of episode one tonight.**

I felt a pang when I realized he'd texted me that last night. And I'd missed it. And he probably felt like I was mad or ignoring him and he would have no idea what was going on or why it was happening. I'd left him clueless by ignoring his texts, not even explaining what I was doing or what I felt. And for the third time in the past twenty-four hours, I realized my logic had been flawed. I'd been going about things the wrong way. I needed to just make up my goddamn mind and do whatever I decided to do rather than doing nothing (or trying to) because that would just end up hurting him and myself. Taking a deep, calming breath, I realized there was nothing I could do about the fact that I hadn't responded now except apologize for my behavior. I clicked on to the next message.

**Sophie?**

I was surprised. Abed had never texted me just one word in all the texts we had exchanged. It made me feel bad, for some reason. I clicked to the most recent message and was promptly overwhelmed.

**I realize we've been talking a lot since Monday, so it seems to me like we're already friends, but a lot of the time when people talk to me, after a while they start to think I'm weird and stop hanging out with me. It kind of seems like that's what's happening here. If you don't want to be friends with me anymore, I understand, but I'd appreciate if you let me know for sure because right now I just feel really confused. And like I have one hat too many. Even if it is a nice hat.**

I could feel the pang in my chest again. The pang of guilt. I'd left him confused by my silence; alone and confused. And that was not the kind of friend I wanted to be. I quickly typed up a response.

_I'm sorry, Abed. I went through a character-building montage,_ I typed, hoping he would appreciate my relating what had happened to film terms. _If it ever happens again I'll be sure to let you know about it instead of turning my phone off. I don't want to stop being friends with you. In fact, to make it up to you, how about you come over to my place for supper sometime? You can bring me back my hat then, too. :d_

I had just set my phone back down when it buzzed.

**Does tomorrow work?**

I smiled.

* * *

**A/N:** Thanks to those who reviewed-please continue to do so. Feedback is greatly appreciated!

See you all Monday!


	4. Grand Optimist

**Chapter Four**

**"GRAND OPTIMIST"  
**

* * *

Sunday night had gone splendidly; Abed had been impressed by the vast amount of nerd cred my interior decorating gave me (my living room was Lord of the Rings themed, my bedroom was Star Wars themed, and my study was Tron themed-along with all the other nerdy items I had scattered throughout the house). He had said at least nine 'cool's over the course of the evening-not that I was counting, or anything. Needless to say, after we had a good long talk about feelings which I was pretty sure he was making a bunch of movie references during, I felt like we were back on track to becoming the best of friends. Well, on my part, anyways. I still wasn't quite sure how Abed felt since he was pretty straight-faced through the entire evening.

Monday morning, April and I were back at Greendale, this time with a number of other nurses helping to run the snack table, do pre-donation interviews to make sure the potential donors' blood should be safe to use for transfusions, and do the actual needle-poking and monitoring the people during donation to make sure no one got anemic and fainted or had an adverse reaction to the process. Safety first, and all that.

Seeing as I was 'young and spry' (and many of the nurses there were not-so-much), I was one of the nurses doing the needle insertions. (The oldest nurses had claimed the sitting jobs right off the hop.) It was one of the main reasons I had taken a job with the blood donation clinic as soon as a job opening was posted; it was highly beneficial to my time at the hospital to be good at inserting needles, especially since it was harder with the thick needles used for blood donation than the typical needle used for everyday medication administration and such in the hospital.

Unlike when we were just doing blood typing, which typically took less than five minutes to do, the blood donation clinic had a much steadier stream of people. A lot of them were just doing it so they had an excuse not to go to class. I knew the feeling-I had done the same thing in university. And hey, at least it's for a good cause. I had just finished inserting someone's needle and checking that everything was in order when I heard someone call my name.

"Hey Sophie!"

I turned and, lo and behold, there was Britta. Tilting my head curiously, I walked over to where she was waiting for someone to put her needle in. I smiled.

"Hi Britta. I can hook you up if you like."

She looked a little skeptical (probably due to my age and thus "lack of experience"), but agreed.

"Actually, there was something I wanted to talk to you about," she said.

I nodded. "Shoot."

"Well...it's about Abed."

"If you're here to tell me he has Asperger's syndrome, I already know, and I'm fine with it."

"How did you-? Oh wait, duh-doy. You're a nurse." She rolled her eyes. "But anyways, that's not what I was going to ask," she said, shaking her head. "What I was going to ask was, you are aware of Abed's weirdness, right? His obsession with pop culture and doing weird things and pretending to be people he really isn't? You know, he even had a mental breakdown just before Christmas break. He claimed that everyone was _stop-motion animated_," she said, her voice lowered to just above a whisper.

I suppressed the urge to laugh. "Look, Britta, I know that your heart's in the right place in telling me these things, but you should know that I'm not exactly what society deems 'normal' myself. I go to sci-fi and anime conventions and dress up as characters from ultra-nerdy series that I like, and they're not always even female characters."

Her eyes widened, and her mouth opened, but she closed it again, like she decided not to say what she'd been wanting to. Instead, she said, "Well...good for you. Way to fight the power, girl!" Her smile seemed a little forced, but I accepted the sentiment behind her words.

"Thanks, Britta." I smiled back. "You know, I'm happy that I'm friends with Abed. Even with my friends that I've known since high school, there were only a couple of them that didn't make fun of me for dressing up for something other than Halloween. I mean, people think it's cute when you're a kid, but as soon as you hit your teens, it's like all of a sudden you're just crazy. Abed not only accepts that as being okay, but he and Troy even dressed up with me. So I'd kind of like to keep on being friends with him. And I realize you and the rest of the study group mean a lot to Abed, so I guess I'd...like to know you're okay with that?" I said, looking at her hopefully. "I mean, I don't want you to feel like I'm trying to hog him all to myself. I know you guys were friends with him first, and I don't want you to feel like I'm stealing him away from you guys. He pretty much thinks of you all as his family, you know."

Britta was silent for a moment, staring up at me as I finished hooking up the blood bag and inserted the needle in her arm. She grimaced a bit as the large needle went in.

"Sorry. Does it hurt?"

She shook her head. "No, just a bit of a pinch. It's nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be."

I smiled. "That means I did it right, then. Here, hold this stress ball and just give it a squeeze every minute or so." Realizing that I couldn't just wait around for her answer, as much as I would've liked to, I turned to leave and make sure everyone was hooked up and doing alright when Britta called for me to wait.

She sighed. "Sorry. I just...it's weird thinking of Abed having a good friend outside of the study group. We are pretty close-knit, kind of like a family," she said with a bit of a smile. "But...you seem like a good person. So for now, I think I can trust you to be good to him. _But_," she said with a stern look, "I _do _want you to spend some time with the rest of us sometime so we can get to know you a bit better. _Capiche?_" She held out her free hand towards me.

I grinned, elated. "I think we have a deal," I said, grabbing her hand and shaking it firmly. "Have a marvelous day!" I said and headed off to help the next person.

I couldn't help but think of how making one friend was now leading to a whole group of new friends. I couldn't wait until this fated 'meeting with the group' would happen, unsure but also excited for how it would pan out.

* * *

"So, Sophster, how're things?" Craig asked while we were sorting through a clothing rack at Garage. "You're friends with Abed now, right?" He held up a pale yellow racerback tanktop for inspection.

I raised an eyebrow and swapped the tanktop for a blue scoop-neck with cutout sections that let blue lace peek through. "Yes," I said, giving him a skeptical look. "Why?"

He gave me an innocent look. I knew immediately he was up to something. "Hm? Oh, no reason. I just wondered if you planned on...being friends with the rest of the group." He refused to meet my gaze now.

I sighed. "Maybe. I don't know. Britta wants me to spend some time with them so they can get to know me. They're just looking out for Abed, though." Oh please don't ask me to spy on them or anything, I thought. I knew Jeff was Craig's type, but I didn't want to be caught in the middle if the study group found out he was getting me to report back to him after I met with them.

"Well, in that case..." he held the shirt I'd given him up to himself to see how it would fit and gave an approving look. "Would you mind subtly suggesting that Jeff should talk to me sometime? I mean, in such a way that he'd think it was his idea."

I gave him an unimpressed look. "You mean like subliminal messaging?"

"Ooh, I'm writing that one down. That's good stuff. Yeah, just like that."

I sighed. "Big C, why don't you just talk to them yourself if you want to be their friend that badly?"

He copied my sigh. "Be_cause_. I'm the dean, nobody wants to be seen with me. That and the Dalmatian 'issue' tends to scare them off once they find out about it..." he muttered.

I snorted.

"Well Big C...you know how I feel about speaking for other people. I won't promise anything," at this point he kind of slumped over, looking depressed, "_however_...I will try to speak well of you should the subject come up in conversation."

"Oh, I knew there was a reason you were my favorite niece!" he said, hugging me tightly. You wouldn't think such a puny guy could have such a tight grip, but he did, and it kind of hurt.

"Ow, okay, okay! Just don't let Amber hear you say that, or you may not live to see tomorrow," I joked.

He grinned and released me. "Don't you worry about me. Now let's _buy_ these bad boys," he said, taking the small haul of clothing he'd amassed over the time we'd been there.

I rolled my eyes, but smiled. Having such a weird uncle was actually pretty cool, in my opinion.

* * *

It was Friday before I saw the study group. Though Abed and I had continued to keep in touch and get to know each other through text, I hadn't seen him since Monday at the blood donation clinic, but it had been so busy that we hadn't had much time to talk, which I'd felt quite disappointed about, but as I was working, I had to actual do the work that was expected of me. It was what I was getting paid for, after all, and a lot of people would complain if I didn't, especially since I was the youngest one there and they expected me to pull my weight to prove I wasn't a useless lump like 'the younger generation seems to be', as one of the senior nurses I worked with had once said. I was so glad I had the day off tomorrow. That way I didn't have to worry about being back home in time to get enough sleep for the next day.

I had quickly showered after I got home from work and picked out my clothes for the occasion. Britta had texted me and informed me that we were all going out to a sit-down restaurant, not too fancy, but more like a family restaurant deal. So casual dress, but not too laidback; any time I was going out was an occasion to dress my best, in my books. Maybe it was just because my older sister was a model, but I believed that wearing a t-shirt and jeans for anything other than a comfortable day at home was unacceptable. Not only that, but I actually liked getting all gussied up-whether that was an adapted trait because of all the times my sister had used me as her style guinea pig or not, I didn't know, but I didn't really care to know. I just found it exciting that I had the opportunity to get dressed up.

I soon settled on an above-the-knee length emerald dress with a foldover collar layered over a black lace shirt and black ribbed stockings, and shoved on a pair of floral-print lace-up boots. Digging through my jewelry box (which was bigger than a normal person's would be-I actually used a shoebox I had decorated with pages from an old manga magazine I used to subscribe to, and it was almost too full to close), I settled on a faux pearl-and-antiqued silver bracelet to complete the look. Stepping in front of the floor-length mirror, I did a little twirl and, satisfied, grinned.

"Well, dahling," I said to my reflection, "time to knock 'em dead."

* * *

Pulling up in front of the restaurant we were to meet at, I felt a bit nervous. I knew I shouldn't have been, because I was just meeting up with Abed's friends, and Abed himself was even going to be there, so it wasn't like I was going into the proverbial lions' den alone or anything. It was just...different than what I was used to. I was used to staying at home, reading manga and watching TV and spending the nights alone, relaxing or lazing about until my next shift at work. It was just different for me to be going out with new people, ones I hadn't known for years, and it was a step outside of my comfort zone. Trying to calm my nerves, I sat in my car for a minute, just breathing deeply. Finally, I mentally berated myself for wasting time when it was already four minutes past when Britta had said to meet them. Exhaling deeply one last time, I locked my car and went inside.

The restaurant was abuzz with multiple conversations taking place at once, but as I approached the maitre d' to ask about where the study group was sitting, I heard them laughing louder than the background noise of the restaurant. I grinned at the maitre d'. "I'm here with the noisy bunch. Should be under Jeff Winger."

The maitre d' gave me a bit of a weird look and nodded before leading me to where they were.

"Hey, there she is!" Britta said, having spotted me first. "Come on, we saved you a seat next to Abed."

True to form, the one open seat was next to Abed. The table seemed to be set up much like the table was in their study room, except for the fact that Britta was on the end next to Jeff, and I was now seated where she would usually sit next to Abed. After getting comfortable in my seat and taking off my coat, I looked up to notice everyone staring at me.

"...Do I have something on my face?" I asked, suddenly feeling self-conscious.

"No. Just amazed at how different you look when you're not wearing scrubs," Annie said. "Love the dress, by the way."

I grinned. "Thanks. I usually don't put make-up on for work because I never have the time to make sure I haven't messed it up throughout the day. And besides, the hospital is about a million degrees, so whatever ladies say they 'don't sweat, they glow' have obviously never worked in a hospital before," I deadpanned.

"Speaking of which," Jeff said, "we were just talking to Abed about how you were actually working at the hospital when he was shooting that documentary of his. Right, Abed?"

Abed nodded. "Yeah," he said, a video camera on the table in front of him which I, being the observant person I was, hadn't noticed before. "I went through all the footage I had and I actually got you on film. Only a few seconds, but you were there."

I laughed. "Must be fate."

Abed's lips curled into a small smile. "Something like that."

Troy smacked his hands on the table, startling everyone.

"Now that I have your attention," he said, "let's order. I don't know about everyone else, but I am _starving_. I could literally eat a rhinoceros right now."

Britta gave him a look of shock, being the animal lover she was.

"What?" he said. "Only a cooked rhinoceros, I wouldn't eat it raw. That's just disgusting."

* * *

**A/N:** Thanks to **TriadBella** and **Hawk2012** for reviewing, and to all who added this to their favorites or alerts, and yes, even those who silently read. However, please remember that feedback is greatly appreciated and consider dropping off a review on your way out!

See you all Thursday!


	5. Underdog

**Chapter Five**

**"UNDERDOG"**

* * *

"Britta! Over here!" I called, waving my arm to get her attention from across the mall food court. A couple people gave me nasty looks for being loud, but I just glared right back. Just because they were jealous of the fact I had friends didn't mean they could shush me with their judgy little eyes.

"Hey Sophie," Britta said, sounding a little out of breath as she plunked her purse down on the table and sat in the seat across from me. "Sorry I'm late, one of my cats just about choked on a piece of string, so I had to rush him over to the vet's. They got it out, but he's staying overnight so they can make sure he's okay."

"Awww! I hope he's okay," I said. Personally I wasn't really a cat person, but I knew Britta's cats were like her babies, and if one of them died she'd be sad, so I was glad the cat lived. If only in a roundabout way. "At least you know he's in good hands now, so you don't have to worry about him too much." Selfish though it might be, I hoped she wouldn't be so distracted by her cat's mishap that she wouldn't be able to have a good time on our little social outing. It wasn't often that I went out to shop (I did the majority of my shopping online, because the glorious internet has just about anything your little heart could desire), but when I did, I could literally spend the entire day shopping given I had the right company-which was usually my sister, because she and I knew each other's taste so well that we could pick out what each other would like blindfolded, but I had a couple friends that I would occasionally go out to shop with that were good shopping partners, as well. I figured in the back of my mind that this would be a good trial run, seeing as Britta and I got along quite well aside from shopping, whether she would be the kind of person I could enjoy going on girls' days out with.

"Thanks Sophie," she said with a smile. "You know, it's kind of nice to spend time with another girl for once. I mean, don't get me wrong, Annie and Shirley are great, but Shirley doesn't usually have time for outings like this because of her kids, and Annie usually wants to go to the bookstore rather than...pretty much anywhere else. And books are expensive! I usually just take them out from the library. Have you seen how much a hardcover book costs these days? Oh my God."

"Oh I know, it's gotten to the point where I don't even buy books from the store anymore, I've started buying them online, mostly second-hand. It's just the stores that are nuts these days. I mean how do they expect people to support them when their prices are so outrageous anyways?"

"Exactly! Oh hey, do you mind if we go in here?" Britta asked, pointing to a store that had more casual and grunge clothing.

I shrugged. "Sure. I get next pick." I stuck out my hand to her.

"Deal," she said, shaking my hand to seal the deal. "Ooh, I bet this would look good on you..."

* * *

"You're doing good, Sophie. I really feel like you're starting to move past what happened," my psychiatrist, Crystal, said. She was a short blond lady, never married; she was married to her job, much as I had been since I'd graduated from university. "Remember to meditate as often as you can, and go out with those new friends of yours. It's good to spend time with people instead of being by yourself." I secretly wondered whether she ever went out with people or if she just sat at home going over patient files for fun, but didn't comment on it.

"I will. Thanks, Crystal. See you next week."

Time to go home and take a nice, long bath, I thought to myself.

Heading out to my car, I wondered if I shouldn't have asked the security guard to walk me out to my car, seeing as it was dark out already. I checked my watch; 8:32pm. No, I thought, it wasn't late enough to merit needing a security guard to walk me out. There wouldn't be any criminals stupid enough to lurk around in front of a lit building, even if it was already dark out. Shaking my head, I walked outside, heading for my car with one hand clutching my purse strap over my chest, and another hand inside my purse, clutched around the can of mace I kept tucked away in it.

When I reached my car, I reluctantly let go of the can of mace, looking around to make sure there really was no one lurking around before I took out my car keys, having to feel around the door a bit before I could find the lock to put the key in.

Next thing I knew, my face was smashed against the car doorframe, and time was fluid before I blinked my eyes open, unsure of where I was before I realized with a start that-I lifted my head up enough to look around and, sure enough-I had just been carjacked.

"God...DAMNIT!" I yelled, checking and finding with much relief that the carjacker had at least had the courtesy to leave my purse with me. Probably wasn't sure when I'd come to, so they decided not to risk me seeing their face. And they were damn lucky I didn't, or I'd have been on their ass in a second. Slowly sitting up and feeling a little dizzy, I dug in my purse until I could find my phone and hesitated a moment over who I should call before finally deciding.

"Yeah," they answered.

"Jeff, I need to bother you for a bit."

"...Damnit."

"Oh shut your face. I just got carjacked and I don't want to worry my sister," I said, standing up and moving towards the front doors of the building so I wasn't standing in the dark like easy pickings for potential muggers. I had already been carjacked, I didn't want to tempt fate any further.

"You don't want to-oh that's a big load of crap, your sister would want to know if you were just carjacked, even if it means you drag her away from some egotistical party."

"Don't play the guilt card on me, Jeff Winger. You just don't want me to ruin your quiet night alone. But I promise you I will post photoshopped pictures of you and the dean on twitter if you don't get your ass out here and help me."

"Where the hell did you-" He cut himself off. "You. You are a terrible person and being carjacked was simply karma come to bite you in the ass." He hung up.

I smirked. I knew he would see it my way.

"So out of curiosity," Jeff said as I climbed into the passenger seat of his car, "why did you call me? I mean, I realize neither Abed nor Troy have a car, but I thought you and Britta were buds now."

"I also thought that being the father of the group, it was _your _responsibility to look after everyone."

"_Ugh_. Don't remind me," he said, making a face. "But seriously, are you okay? Your forehead has a gigantic goose egg on it."

I touched it gingerly and sucked air in through my teeth at the stinging sensation. I growled. "I swear, I want to kill that stupid carjacker. He is so effing lucky I didn't see his face."

Jeff raised an eyebrow, but didn't take his eyes off the road. "Whoa, tiger. Ease off. I realize you just lost your mode of transportation and all, but I can help you file an insurance claim if you want me to. Y'know, past lawyer and all. I'm good with legal documents."

I sighed and slumped back into the seat. "Thanks, Jeff. I'll have to take you up on that offer. I honestly don't know what I'm going to do. I've never even used public transportation before, but now I'm going to have to actually_ rely_ on it... Ughhh." I sighed, pulling up twitter on my phone and typing, _Got jumped by a carjacker. Consider my day made. #sarcasm_

"So where am I even driving you? You realize I have no idea where you live, right? Right now I'm just heading for the nearest Starbucks because I need a gigantic coffee, and from the looks of things, you could probably use one, too."

I sighed. "Honestly that sounds heavenly right now. I could use a mochaccino half the size of me topped with enough whipped cream to smother myself with."

My phone buzzed, and, curious, I looked down at the screen to see it said, _One new message from Batman._ Opening it up, I read it and laughed.

"Well, Jeeves, once we've got our caffeine dosage, I guess you can drive me to Abed's place."

Jeff let out a long-suffering sigh. "Fine. Just don't think I'll keep taxiing you around after today. Once I help you with your insurance claim, I'm done."

I smirked. "Thanks... _dad_."

"Oh not you, too!"

* * *

I stood in front of Abed's door for a moment before taking a deep breath and knocking, rocking back and forth on my heels until the door swung open to reveal Abed, already dressed in his pyjamas. I grinned at the little bat symbols on his pyjama pants.

"Casual bedtime Batman?" I asked jokingly.

"Nope. That would require a cape," he said, stepping aside to let me in.

"Ah. How silly of me," I replied good-naturedly. I kicked off my shoes next to the door before promptly sprawling out on his couch, throwing an arm over my eyes. "Argh. Today is just not my day. First I had to work overtime because somebody didn't show up for their shift, and then I got jumped outside of a freaking psychiatrist's office, of all places," I said, realizing that I was complaining, but feeling better that I was voicing my frustration.

"Why were you outside a psychiatrist's office?" he asked, throwing a bag of popcorn in the microwave.

"Eh...mostly because of some stuff that happened a couple years ago, but it also helps me keep the stress from work at a minimum." I flipped onto my stomach on the couch and looked over at Abed. "Sorry. I don't mean to be secretive, it's just something I don't really like to talk about outside the psychiatrist's office. It's not exactly a pretty bedtime story, either."

Abed just nodded. "That's okay. Did you want to watch a movie? I'm kind of in the mood for some X-men cartoons."

I grinned, thankful for the change of topic. "Sure thing. I haven't watched that since...well, since it came out, really."

He gave me a weird look before rushing to pop the first season in. "How have you been living?" he asked in an incredulous tone.

"Well, there's this wonderful thing called _breathing_ I like to do most of the time..." I answered cheekily.

The microwave beeped.

"Ooh, popcorn," I said, finally motivated enough to get up off the couch. I grabbed the popcorn and a clean-looking bowl that had been sitting in a stack of several plates and bowls on an end table, emptying the bag out into the bowl and, being the smart person I was, burning my fingers in the process. "_Ouch_. Damnit, popcorn, just because I'm going to eat you doesn't mean you should exact pre-emptive revenge on me. You don't even know I'm the one who'll end up eating you." I heard Abed laugh from where he was fiddling with the DVD player. "Hush your face! Just because I talk to popcorn doesn't mean I'm insane. I've been tested!"

"I never said a word."

I glared at him, but brought the popcorn over and sat on the couch anyways. "You're lucky I'm forgiving enough to not take your popcorn and run. But that's just because I don't want to be like that stupid carjacker," I said, eyes narrowing as I spoke of that-guy-that-shall-never-be-named. Or maybe I should name him, something really goofy-sounding, just to get back at him. Yes, that was what I would do. "I'm going to call him Butticus. Serves him right for stealing my car. Damn you, Butticus!"

Abed sat on the other side of the popcorn bowl as the DVD started playing. "I think you should focus on the TV now. You seem to be thinking really abstractly due to a combination of the anger and stress of having your car stolen. The TV should be relaxing."

I sighed. "You're probably right. Probably. But I will never admit it outright because I am stubborn like that."

Abed shrugged. "That's okay. Just don't eat all the popcorn," he said as I shoved a giant handful in my mouth.

"No promises," I said around the popcorn, but it came out more like "Nom promfitheth." I put a hand over my mouth, trying not to choke as my shoulders shook with laughter. I calmed after a minute, becoming enraptured with the cartoon on TV.

"I should make a Jubilee costume. I haven't cosplayed X-Men since I made my Rogue costume in high school. And Jubilee's pretty cool, if a little angsty."

"Can't really blame her. She is a teenager after all. She's years younger than the rest of the X-Men, so she doesn't always feel like she really belongs," Abed reasoned.

I nodded. We continued trading comments on the show as we went through the rest of the season, and eventually, I'm not sure at which point exactly, I must have fallen asleep during one of the episodes, because when I gradually woke up, I was lying on the couch with a blanket tucked around me, the title screen of the DVD playing on loop but with the volume muted, and Abed was curled up on the bottom bunk bed, only the top of his head visible from under the blankets. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, I stumbled to my feet and headed straight for the bathroom, knowing without a mirror that my hair would be an absolute terror and wanting to tame it before Abed woke up.

After having fussed sufficiently with my rebellious hair, I finally gave up when it looked halfway-but-not-quite acceptable and decided to see what all Abed had for breakfast so I could put something together as thanks for letting me stay over. Being that he lived in the dorms, I realized with disappointment that I probably wouldn't be able to make anything baked or fried. Instead I snooped around in the mini-fridge he had and, finding little more than a half-full carton of milk, a couple apples, some grapes, and a box of waffles. Sighing, I decided to make a pseudo fruit salad and toast some waffles; better than nothing, I guess.

By the time I was finished chopping up the apples and toasting enough waffles for both of us, I heard a thump and turned around to see that Abed had rolled out of bed. He jumped to his feet as though it were reflex.

I raised my eyebrow. "You do that a lot?"

"Mostly on days that end in 'y'. Did you make breakfast?"

"Did I...?" I said, before staring curiously at the plates of food and the knife in my hand. "Well, would you look at that! I guess I did." I grinned.

Abed tilted his head a bit and was silent for a moment. "Nobody's ever made me breakfast before. Except my dad. But parents are kind of expected to make breakfast for their kids. So I guess that makes this a first." He came to stand in front of me awkwardly, as though unsure what to do, before gracing me with what was probably the world's most awkward hug. "Thanks, Sophie."

I patted his back a couple times, also infected with awkwardness due to the concentrated levels of it in the air. "Uh...no problem. I like making food for people. Even though you don't exactly have a wide selection to choose from," I said in a joking manner, although it really was true.

"True. I usually don't have guests, though, so normally I don't have much need for variety. Besides, there's always Lucky Charms," he said, pointing to the box of cereal perched on top of the TV.

I shook my head. "Seriously, Abed, you should really have a more balanced diet. You're going to make yourself sick not getting any variety in your diet," I said as I held out a plate of food for him and handed him the syrup to use first. "Tell you what-why don't you come over to my place sometime this week and I'll cook you something. We could even make it a weekly thing, maybe. Hey, do you think your study group would be interested in that? We could even make it into a classic board game night or something."

"Cool. Cool cool cool," he said, drowning his waffles with sugary goodness. "I'll ask them tomorrow when we have class. Text you the answer?" He pointed at me.

"You know it."

"Sounds good," he said, mimicking a gun with his hand. "_Pew pew_!"

* * *

**A/N:** A huge thank-you to everyone who's reviewed so far. You are amazing and I appreciate you. Please continue to give feedback, constructive criticism, etc.

See you all on Monday!


	6. Head Vs Heart

**Chapter Six**

**"HEAD VS. HEART"  
**

* * *

"Hiiii!" I heard Shirley's voice call over the sound of multiple pairs of feet at my porch door.

"Oh hi guys, come on in! Just leave your shoes on the boot rack there if you don't mind," I said, wiping my hands on a towel as I poked my head into the porch to see everyone taking off their shoes. "Feel free to have a seat in the living room for a bit, the lasagna'll just be a few more minutes. I made it vegetarian, you're welcome Britta," I said with a grin. "My sister's vegetarian so I have the most delicious vegetarian recipes. But for my fellow meat-lovers, I also made a side of bacon and cheese stuffed chicken breasts."

"Breasts-my favorite," Pierce said with a grin.

"Pierce!" Shirley scolded.

"What? I only speak the truth."

I grinned as everyone chatted amiably in the living room, interspersed by the occasional 'typical Pierce' comment. True to form, it was only a couple minutes before the timer for the lasagna went off, and I quickly took it out of the oven, placing it and the chicken that I had wrapped in tin foil to keep hot on trivets on the two tables I had pushed together in the dining room, seeing as the one table I usually had wasn't exactly big enough to seat eight people.

"Alright. Soup's on, people!"

"Oh man, you have soup, too? Awesome!" Troy said, hopping over the back of the couch and racing to the table, only to have his face fall when he realized something. "Wait...there's no soup. Aw, man..."

I struggled not to laugh. "Sorry, Troy, it's just what my mom always says. She says 'soup's on' instead of 'supper's ready'." I patted his shoulder. "Don't worry, I can always make you soup some other time if it makes you feel better."

"Okay," he said, still looking sort of put out.

"Oh my gosh," Britta said. "Broccoli salad. I haven't had that in so long!"

I chewed my lip. "Well it's a bit of a different spin on it, it's curry broccoli salad. I hope you still like it. If not, don't force yourself to eat it. I have some Caesar salad too if you prefer."

"Hey, I'm cool. I like trying new things. Go with the flow and all," she said, performing a one-person wave. I couldn't help but snort, but tried to cover it up as a cough. I'm not really sure how effective it was (it sounded weird even to my ears), but nobody questioned it, so I didn't fuss over it.

Annie skipped over to the kitchen counter. "Do you need any help with passing out drinks or anything? I noticed you don't have any cups set out yet."

I grinned. "Actually I made some punch, it's just in the fridge. I have some plastic cups in that cupboard over there," I said, pointing at the one I was referring to, "if you wouldn't mind setting them on the island for me? I thought we could just have the punch set out there so we don't have too much stuff crowding the table."

"Sounds good! Consider it done," she said in a chipper voice. I smiled. It was hard for Annie's upbeat attitude not to rub off on you a bit when you spent time with her.

After everyone had a drink and we were seated around the table, I turned my head to Shirley.

"Did you want me to say a blessing?" I asked.

"Oh, yes!" she said with a big smile. "Sophie, I didn't realize you were Christian, too!"

I smiled, not really wanting to crush her happiness over having a newly-found Christian friend by telling her I was actually agnostic, instead saying, "My parents are devout Catholics, so they raised my sister and I as such."

"Oh, I see," she said, seeming slightly less excited now. I was kind of surprised at that, but tried not to let it show; after all, all the Christian denominations stemmed from a single church, so I didn't see why the denominations fought so much about the little details; after all, the main thing was that they all believed in God, right? That was one of the things that didn't really appeal to me about the church, but I would never say that to Shirley. She was so nice I would feel bad if I hurt her, even if it was just by telling her I didn't exactly share her beliefs. It would feel kind of similar to how I imagined punching a baby deer would feel.

I forced a small smile. "Well...let's pray then," I said, grabbing Britta and Abed's hands as they were the people I was sitting between. After everyone had done the same with the people beside them, I bowed my head and recited the same prayer my father usually used, not wanting to try and pull one out of my ass and possibly inadvertently make Shirley mad. "Bless us, oh Lord, and these thy gifts, which we are about to receive, from thy bounty, through Christ, our Lord. Amen." I immediately dropped Britta and Abed's hands, although I had to admit, it had felt weird holding Abed's hand. Like, weird in a good way. His hand was warm and dry, and for some reason my hand felt super-sensitive to his touch. It was...odd. I hadn't held hands with any guys, friends or not, for over two years now. My mind was racing, confused, and I was unsure what to think of the little tingles I had felt in my hand before I had removed it from his. So for that moment, I chose to go with the option that would hopefully keep me the most sane I could be for the rest of the evening: Ignore it.

"Well," I said, clapping my hands together with a smile, "let's dig in, shall we?"

There was a general murmur of consent as everyone started scooping food onto their plates and passing the dishes around. It reminded me of my family's yearly Thanksgiving dinner get-together, where all my cousins and aunts and uncles gathered for the yearly bitchfest-er, I mean, _loving,_ caring mealtime, except here everyone actually got along, and there was certainly a distinct lack of bratty children measuring less than three feet in height that liked to kick me in the shin and then cry to their overprotective mothers when I did nothing more than scold them even though really what I wanted to do was smack them around a bit and ground them for a week. (No, I'm not bitter. Why do you ask?)

The meal was going swimmingly, with some good conversation going on about summer break that would start in a month for them, until Pierce opened his mouth and made everything ten types of awkward.

"So Sophie, are you and Abed..." he trailed off, using his fingers to mimic a penis going in a vagina.

"_Whoa_. Sophie, do not answer that, I do not need to hear that under the rules of agreement sixty-nine," my sister said as she came into the kitchen, looking like she had just finished a photo shoot. There was some giggling at the mention of sixty-nine, and I resisted the urge to face-palm.

"Hey Breezy. What brings you here? Want some food?" I asked to be polite, though I sent her a look that read please don't. I knew they probably weren't like that, but a lot of the time in the past when I had made friends, as soon as they met my sister, it was like all of a sudden I was chopped liver and they only wanted to hang out with her, not me. I really liked Abed and his study group, and call it selfish, but I didn't want to have to share the warmth I felt with them with my sister. Thankfully, she seemed to understand my look, giving a slight nod in response.

"That's okay, I just came by to return your skirt. I just got off the set-" Aha! I was right, "-and I'm beat. Enjoy your supper, all!" she said with a wave before beating a hasty retreat.

Jeff, who had been rummaging around in his messenger bag, cursed and stopped his search, looking disgruntled. "Damnit. I was going to get her to sign my magazine for me."

I rolled my eyes. "She probably would've gotten ticked off at you if you asked anyways," I said. "She gets upset when people ask her for autographs when she's not out in a public place, like when she's at somebody's house or in a bathroom-which has happened a surprising number of times, believe it or not."

"That sounds rather awkward," Troy said, seeming a little weirded out by the fact.

"Quite," I replied, before rubbing my hands together. "Okay, so who all is ready for dessert?"

* * *

"Thanks for doing this for us, Sophie. It means a lot," Abed said, and Troy echoed the sentiment.

"No problem. I don't mind sewing the costumes for you as long as you buy the fabric," I said, taking out the measuring tape from my sewing kit. "Arms out, please." Truth be told, I was kind of nervous about doing this for Abed when just holding his hand a few days earlier had set my nerves singing, but I also wanted to test out a theory I had, which was why I had agreed to make both Abed's and Troy's costumes despite the load of costumes I was nowhere near finished that I wanted to make for myself for this year's convention season.

Sure enough, as I looped the measuring tape around Abed's chest, my hands brushed against his side, and I felt goosebumps raise on my skin. It was...well, _exhilarating_.

I didn't dare try to drag out taking the measurements, because I knew how observant Abed was, and I also knew he might ask a lot of questions, which I didn't want him doing in front of Troy, who, being slightly more aware of how people display feelings for each other outside of film, might actually catch on to what was going on. All too soon, it was over, and I motioned for Abed to have a seat while I took Troy's measurements, slightly apprehensive and unsure whether my theory would be correct as I began. My hands brushed against his side as I took his chest measurement, and...

Nothing.

I wasn't sure if I should be happy or agitated that my theory had proved correct.

Oh well, I thought. I'll deal with it later. For now, I would just focus on getting started on their costumes.

"Okay guys," I said once I was finished taking Troy's measurements, "here's the deal. I'll do the cutting out of the jacket pieces because they're more complicated with the two different colors, but you guys can help out by cutting out the fabric for the pants. Troy, you follow this line for your pants," I said, pointing to one of the numbered lines indicating which size it was for, "and Abed, you follow this one. That'll ensure the best fit for you."

"Thanks again, Sophie. This is a lot cheaper than commissioning them from someone," Abed said.

"Yeah, and it's a lot less likely that they'll mess it up and we won't know until we get the costume in the mail," Troy frowned, having had a bad experience with an online costume commissioner.

I smiled, before I had a miniature epiphany. "Hey, Abed. You're going as Data, right?"

"That is correct."

"How good are your dancing skills?" I asked with a grin.

"Pretty adequate. Why do you ask?"

I shrugged. "Well, originally I was going to go as Deanna Troi, but I also have a good wig for Beverly Crusher, soooo..."

Abed and Troy both raised their eyebrows.

"Wait, I know what scene you're referring to." Abed looked a little impressed. "If we can pull it off we could get it on video and tweet it to Brent Spiner and Gates McFadden," he said, sounding awed. "This is the most amazing thing a girl's ever offered to do with me."

I laughed, carefully cutting out pieces of the contrasting fabric for the uniform shirt. "Well seeing as it's something I want to do, too, it's no hassle for me," I said.

Abed focused back on cutting. "We should get together sometime this week to practice. There's only a month until Greendale Sci-Con," he said. He turned to Troy, who had his tongue poking out the corner of his mouth in concentration as he worked. "What do you think we should do first when we get to Sci-Con?" Silence. "...Troy?"

"Huh what?" He looked around before noticing that Abed was looking at him. "Oh, were you talking to me? Sorry, could you repeat that? This fabric-cutting takes a lot of concentration. What if I mess up? I don't wanna make Levar Burton mad."

"Don't worry Troy, I don't think he'd be mad, if anything he'd probably be impressed that you made the effort to make the costume yourself rather than just buying it like most people," Abed reassured him. "And I was just asking what you think we should do first when we get to Sci-Con."

"Ohhh. Hey, I hear this year their mystery guest is actually going to be _Wil Wheaton_," he said.

"No way! In that case, I'm bringing my TNG poster with me for him to sign," I said, getting more excited for the convention as we talked about it. Convention season was what I lived for, and was why I preferred to have a casual position at work rather than a part-time or full-time, because then I could just tell scheduling I was unavailable for whatever the convention dates were and just pack my bags and _go_. It was fantastic. In my opinion, anyways. It certainly wasn't for people who worried too much about whether they would get enough shifts all the time, but since I was on casual at two different places, it was easy to pick up as many shifts as I wanted.

"If he's there, you should pretend you're his mom. Maybe he'll give you a hug, and then we could indirectly hug Wil Wheaton by hugging you," Abed pointed out.

I laughed, chucking a pillow at him from the couch behind me and whacking him in the face as his hands were busy cutting fabric. There was a long moment of silence as the pillow fell to the floor and both Abed and Troy turned to stare at me with an _'oh no she didn't'_ look on their faces. They both turned to look at each other then.

"_Pillow fight_!"

"Noooo! What have I done!"

* * *

**A/N:** Thank you to everyone who's reviewed so far. You know who you are, cutie muffins. The proud... the few... the reviewers! I salute you!

Also, I ask that you continue to uphold your reviewers' pride and review again! ;D Thank yoooou.

I also noticed that I garnered some more followers as of last chapter. Hello to you too, dear followers, and I hope you enjoy both the silliness and the dramatics to come.

See you all next Monday!


	7. On Top of the World

**Chapter Seven:**

**"ON TOP OF THE WORLD"  
**

* * *

"Phew! That should do it," I said, wiping my brow with the edge of my sleeve and admiring mine and Abed's handiwork. We had pushed all of the furniture in my living room up to the walls so that we would have a clear space to practice our dance routine. Rather than drop a bunch of money on renting an actual dance studio for practicing, I had proposed we just use my living room to practice in, as the flooring of my living room was hardwood.

"Okay," I said, "this'll be a lot more accurate once we have our costumes to wear, but for now, we can just make do with wearing our wigs for practice...or in your case, just having your hair combed differently," I rolled my eyes, but smiled nonetheless. We got into position, standing side-by-side, and I turned to look at Abed. "So, _Data_," I winked, "Let's start off with something simple. Stomp...pop." I performed the actions as I said them, thus starting our fake dance lesson.

As we progressed into the harder sequences-with Abed insisting on keeping up the scripted speech between Doctor Crusher and Data from the original episode-I was impressed at Abed's dancing skills.

"Abed, where did you learn to dance like that?" I asked when we had finished running through the routine and were sprawled out on the couch, curious.

"TV. I used to watch a lot of instructional shows when I was growing up, and there was this one dance channel that I would watch after school. I used to have the idea that I had to try everything they did on TV, so I learned a lot, but it was also how I ended up breaking my collarbone one time, because I saw Batman use his cape to glide from one building to another, and I thought if I got a cape like his I could do that, too. Obviously, it didn't work."

I tried not to laugh, but failed. I laughed so hard that tears leaked out of my eyes.

"S-s-sorry Abed," I choked out between laughter.

"That's okay. After that, I realized pretty quick that not everything you see on TV is really doable. That's why it's TV. It's meant to defy the laws of what ordinary people can get away with. That's what makes it so interesting."

"So if real life were like TV all the time, you think it would get boring?"

"Yeah. It'd become more predictable. Once you found out what genre your life was you'd be able to tell what sort of things would happen to you. Like if your life was a horror movie, for example."

I nodded. "I see your point. And that would be a really terrible genre to be stuck in. Unless you were a psycho killer, I guess, in which case it would be like a dream come true." I flopped over the arm rest of the couch. "Okay. I think I'm stuck. I haven't been exercising as much as I should lately, so dancing has officially sapped me of any and all energy. I guess I'll just sit here until I either regain the energy to get back up or manage to move that bag of chips with my mind." I squinted at said bag of chips as though trying to focus telekinetic ability, but alas, I had no such luck.

"I can grab it if you want," Abed offered, moving to stand up.

"Urgh. If you're getting up anyways, could you get me an apple instead? I'm trying to be healthy. Not that it's really working, as you can tell," I said with a pointed look at the chip bag.

"I can help you get rid of the temptation," he said, wiggling his eyebrows.

I laughed. "Go right ahead. Out of sight, out of mind, after all. _Hopefully._"

"Think positive!" He said as he grabbed me an apple from the fruit bowl on the counter, tossing it at me. I fumbled with it for a second, but managed not to drop it.

"Winning!" I said, holding it up in a victorious manner. Abed clapped, and I bowed. "Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week."

"You're moving next week?"

"Oh so you're a wise guy now. You know what I meant!"

* * *

"Troy, how do you know if you like someone as more than a friend?" Abed asked as they sat on the couch in the group's usual study room, trying to study for Anthropology. It wasn't working very well; they kept getting distracted, like Abed had just been.

"Uh...you think they're attractive?" Troy replied, not really sure what Abed was asking.

"Well I know that much," Abed said. "I mean like, when you're friends with someone, and you know they're fun to hang out with and have a lot of traits you like and you both get along really well, but you're not sure if your feelings for them are strong enough to try and move past the friend zone because you enjoy being their friend and you might never be able to be their friend again if you mess things up after you move past the friend zone."

For a moment, Troy just about panicked, thinking that Abed was talking about him and Britta, but then realized he didn't have anything to be worried about.

"Ohhh, you're talking about Sophie. Right?"

"I thought we'd already established that. Why, were you thinking of someone else?" He gave Troy an odd look.

"Nope. Not me. Wouldn't dream of it," he said a little too loudly.

Abed stared at him for a moment, but didn't say anything more about it. "So about me and Sophie."

"What about you and Sophie?" Troy said. "Dude, she's a gorgeous nerd. She's like the rarest Pokemon ever! What you need to do is take a lesson from Pokemon right now."

"Ah. So I should focus on defeating Team Rocket."

"No, dude. Gotta catch 'em all. And no, I don't mean literally go out and catch them all. I mean, she's the rare Pokemon. You gotta snatch her up before someone else does. And just because she doesn't seem interested in anyone else right now doesn't necessarily mean no one else is interested in her."

Abed was quiet for a moment, a look of thoughtfulness on his face. Finally he said, "You're right."

"Thank you."

"...I'll think about it."

"Wha-oh, come on! You even said I was right!"

* * *

"Okay guys, do either of you have anything breakable in your luggage? Because if not, I want to pack those in the trunk first and put the box with my wig heads in it on top of them. The snacks can go in the backseat for easy access. Sound good?"

"Aye-aye, cap'n," Troy said as he and Abed snapped a salute.

I grinned. It was finally time for the sci-fi convention. Abed and I had perfected our routine, and all three of us had our finished costumes packed neatly away in the trunk of the car I had rented temporarily out of frustration and disdain in regards to public transportation. Though the convention was in town so we didn't have to go on a road trip, Abed and Troy had proposed that we drive around for a while anyways, stop at a fast-food place for lunch, and then stay at a hotel for the weekend to make it feel as though we _had_ gone on a road trip. It was an amusing notion, and since I had only ever gone on one road trip with friends before, I agreed to it. It was nice to know that I had friends that I could do such completely spontaneous things with. (Although really, with Abed and Troy, that was literally just the tip of the iceberg.)

When everything was packed neatly (and safely, for my wig heads' sakes) away in their designated places, we piled into the car, and I noticed with a bit of happiness that Abed was sitting in the passenger seat, while Troy was sitting in the back. Buckling in, I pulled the car out into traffic, deciding I would drive us out to the perimeter highway for a bit of a more 'road trippy' feel.

"My CDs are all in the glove compartment if you want to take a look at them," I noted, spurring Abed to take out the two thick CD wallets there. He handed one back to Troy and started flipping through the other one.

"They're sorted alphabetically by band name. Nice," he commented.

"Sean Kingston...Skrillex...The Who... Seriously, is there nothing you _don't_ have?" Troy said, sounding incredulous.

"Whoa there. Most of those are CDs my sister gave me. I mean yes, I do like all of them, or at the very least I don't hate any of them. I just have...music moods, I guess you'd call them. Y'know, where I want to listen to a specific type of music."

"Yeah, I get that. I have certain food moods, where I want to eat a certain food...but it's usually junk food, and it's usually all of the time."

"Sure, Troy. It's _exactly _like that," I said, grinning.

"We should listen to some Journey first," Abed said, sticking the CD in. "An epic way to begin our road trip, and thus make the road trip in itself undoubtedly epic even if something by some off chance goes horribly awry."

"Abed...I do hope you didn't just jinx us," I said slowly, drawing out the syllables.

"...Sorry. I'll reverse it somehow."

I sighed. "It's okay. At least this is just a rental car and not my sister's, like I had planned on borrowing...she would murder me with a dull cheese grater if I wrecked her car."

"Seriously?" Troy asked, giving me a weird look in the rearview mirror.

I gave him a flat look in return. "Pray you never see her bad side."

Conversation continued, interspersed by crazy air guitar solos by both Abed and Troy as I tried not to get too distracted from the road by their antics (which was quite difficult). All too soon it was noon, and I took the exit off the highway and headed back into the city, hunting for a decent place to eat lunch.

"Pizza Hut?"

"Nah, takes too long to get your food. And personally not a huge fan of their buffets. They don't often have a very good selection to choose from," Abed stated matter-of-factly.

"Wendy's?"

"Hmm...they've made some changes recently, including the removal of their amazing taco salad from the menu, and I'm protesting by never going there again until they bring it back. I have a petition if you wanna sign it," Troy said.

"Well, my hands are kind of preoccupied right now, but I'll get back to you on that later... Ooh, a Five Guys!"

"Yes!" they both chorused, and I immediately got into the turning lane (yes, I shoulder-checked first, don't worry).

After I parked, we all moseyed on into the restaurant, and I glanced at both Abed and Troy as we stood in line-being as it was lunch hour, the restaurant was kind of busy.

"Are either of you thinking what I'm thinking?" I asked.

"If you're thinking bacon cheeseburger with all of the toppings and Cajun fries, then yes," Abed said.

"You are psychic," Troy said, looking at him wide-eyed.

"Indeed. Mostly I just want to get all of the toppings so that I can say 'give me ALL of the things!'" I grinned. "I'll probably end up picking most of the mushrooms off after. I don't get what people see in mushrooms. They're just...ick."

Troy turned his wide-eyed expression on me. "Dude, what is wrong with you? Mushrooms are like little pieces of heaven."

I made a face. "Well heaven can keep them, because I don't want 'em."

"You said your sister is a vegetarian. Does she make you eat mushrooms when you eat together?" Abed asked.

I rolled my eyes. "Yes. And I greatly dislike it."

"But you don't hate it?"

"Well...hate's a pretty strong word. I greatly dislike it because I greatly dislike mushrooms themselves, but I can't say I hate it, because she only forces me to eat them when we're eating together, and I like being with my sister." I smiled.

"You're pretty close with your sister, aren't you?"

I tilted my head to the side, looking at Abed curiously. "Yes...why?"

"No real reason," he said. "It's just that I'm an only child, so I don't really know what it's like to have siblings. A lot of people say they can't stand their siblings, but you seem to enjoy being with your sister. It's interesting."

Finally having reached the front of the line, we ordered our food and took it to a rare empty table, which we barely beat someone else to. They stomped off in a huff.

I shook my head. "Some people are just sore losers."

"Really? He didn't look sore to me, but I dunno about the other part..." Troy grinned.

It didn't take long for us to eat, but we must have taken at least three times as long as we would've otherwise, just from talking and laughing (and hogging the table so no one else could have it). Soon enough, though, we were on our way, back 'on the road', as it were.

A few minutes more of driving and we arrived at the hotel, one that was on the block next to the convention center where Sci-Con would be held. With almost two hours yet to spare, we decided to move our stuff into the room so that we wouldn't have to do it in the dark when we were done at the convention for the day.

The first thing I did when I got in the room, after I tucked my bags away in the little closet, was claim one of the beds by taking off the bedspread. (So sue me, I wasn't comfortable sleeping in the same bed as one of the guys. I mean, they were my friends and all, but we'd only been friends for a couple months, which wasn't long enough to merit that level of comfortability in my books. I figured if they didn't want to sleep in the same bed, one of them could always get a cot and we'd draw straws to see who had to take it for the night.)

"Why are you taking the covers off the bed?" Troy asked cautiously.

I gave him a flat look. "Do you know how many germs are on these bedspreads?"

"Is that a rhomboidical question?"

"I think the word you're looking for is _rhetorical_. And yes, yes it is."

"Stop correcting me! It's so exacerbating!" he said, stepping into the bathroom and slamming the door.

I couldn't help but call out, "_Exasperating!_" I grinned cheekily.

* * *

"Dude, I can not _believe_ you two! Abed, why didn't you ever tell me you could dance? We could've taken dance class together, man," Troy said as we arrived back at our hotel room for the night, sounding a little put-out.

"I didn't want you to think I was trying to be better than you. I know you can be pretty competitive sometimes."

"Still," he said, "I'm glad I was able to get that on video. Did you see how many people were filming that, too? Man, it was _crazy_."

"Yeah. And then _Wil Wheaton_ passed by on his way to his next panel," I said proudly. Of course, it hadn't entirely been an accident that Wil Wheaton had passed by where we were performing between panels-we had kind-of sort-of maybe a little stalkerishly went through the convention schedule to see where Wil was going to be throughout the day and scheduled and placed our gig accordingly so that it would be at the time and place he would most likely see us performing. (I take no credit for that whatsoever-it was all Abed's idea, not mine.)

"I will treasure the picture of Wil Wheaton with all of us for the rest of my life," Abed said seriously before turning his head to look at me. "Thank you, Sophie. If you hadn't done that with me, we might not have even been able to talk to Wil outside of the autograph-signing session."

"Geez, lay off," I said, rolling my eyes, though it did make me feel a little proud of my idea. Not that my ego needed to be puffed up any more than it already was, so my sister would say anyways. "You made just as much effort as I did to be able to pull that off. We both deserve a pat on the back for that."

Troy promptly patted us both on the back.

"Thanks, Troy," we both said at the same time. Abed and I glanced at each other, then all three of us said, "Jinx." We broke down in laughter.

We stayed up late watching _Serenity_ and eating junk food, not caring that we were getting up early the next morning for a panel we wanted to go to.

I was happy.

* * *

**A/N:** Thank you for reading-please remember to drop off a review on your way out! See you next Monday!


	8. Bleeding Out

**A/N: **Just a cautionary warning: this chapter contains death (non-graphic). I recommend listening to _Snowbird_ by Catherine McLellan and The Good Lovelies while reading this (you can find it on YouTube).

Enjoy. Thank you for reading, and please remember to drop off a review on your way out. See you next Monday.

* * *

**Chapter Eight:**

**"BLEEDING OUT"  
**

* * *

"See you guys! Don't be strangers!" I called out jokingly as Abed and Troy hauled their stuff towards Abed's dorm where they were going to be having a-and I quote-"manly sleepover".

"Bye!" they called, unable to wave due to their hands being full of bags and miscellaneous stuff they had bought at the convention. I chuckled, pulling away from the curb and starting the drive back to my house.

By the time I got back, I was thoroughly exhausted. We had had very little sleep during the weekend due to almost all the panels we wanted to go to being either early in the morning or at night, and then both nights we found it difficult to sleep because we were excited about the prospect of the next day and what it might hold. It had been amazing, though, overall. I had only ever had one friend willing to go to conventions with me, but she had only been into anime, not sci-fi, so it was exhilarating to have friends interested enough in the genre to go to the convention with me rather than having to look on the convention's online forums to try and find somebody to hang out with during the convention-whenever I did that, it just felt sort of awkward and forced, so I often ended up not going rather than resorting to that if I didn't have someone I already knew to go with me for the weekend. Needless to say, I felt that from then on going to the summer convention would almost certainly be a yearly thing for Abed, Troy, and I.

When I got home, I promptly ditched my luggage just inside the door and kicked off my shoes. Afraid that I wouldn't have the energy to get back up once I sat down, I grabbed one of the meals I had pre-cooked from my freezer and popped it in the microwave, too lazy to do anything more than that, and leaned against the counter to wait while it heated. Glancing with vague disdain at the pile of luggage by the door, I sighed, figuring that I should probably put my things away but then blowing it off with the resolution to eat my supper first and worry about putting stuff away later. The microwave had just beeped that it was finished when I heard my phone going off in my purse, which I had deposited right smack-dab in the middle of the dinner table. Frowning in confusion, I tried to think of who it might be. It shouldn't have been work, because I had expressly told them I would be unavailable for any shifts during the weekend, and I hadn't noticed anything of Abed's or Troy's left in the car... I walked over and plucked the phone out of my purse.

Restricted caller ID? Maybe there was a miscommunication at work about my being unavailable...? That was the only place I could think of that had a restricted caller ID...

I flipped the phone open. "Hello...?"

"_Hello, is this Sophie Hazel Tanners?_" Their voice sounded grim even over the phone. I felt a sense of dread pooling in my gut.

"Yes, that would be me..."

"_I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but your sister...she's here at the hospital,_" they said. "_She's been in an accident._"

I didn't need to hear anymore. I dropped the phone and ran.

I burst through the doors of the intensive care unit, scared out of my mind and wishing Abed was there to hold my hand, but of course no one other than immediate relatives were allowed in the room. My hands were shaking as I entered the room where she lay, my eyes immediately drawn to the maze of tubes and cords all attached to my sister at one point or another. Being a nurse meant that, unfortunately, I knew exactly what each and every one of them was for. I couldn't help it-I broke down, falling to my knees beside her bed as I cried loudly and unattractively, clutching her hand. From all of the machines she was hooked up to, I could tell that there would be no waking up for her. My gorgeous model sister, who would have turned the ripe young age of thirty in four months, was brain-dead, with a breathing machine moving her lungs for her because she could no longer do it herself.

I cried until my eyes were so sore I could barely open them and my throat was raw. Realizing my hand was clenched in a tight fist around my sister's fingers, I slowly loosened my grip. I didn't want to let go. But as I stared at my sister's body, unmoving except for the machine-induced rise and fall of her chest, I realized that she, for one, already had.

I had no choice in the matter. I glared at her body in betrayal and hurt.

"How dare you leave me behind," I whispered; my voice would not come out any louder than that from all the crying I had done.

She didn't respond. She _couldn't_ respond.

I was completely and utterly alone in my grief. And for me, that was the worst part of all.

A nurse knocked softly on the door and came into the room. Looking up, even through the tears that blurred my vision, I could tell she was a nurse I had worked with before. Not often, but I knew her nonetheless, and from the look of pity and sympathy on her face, I could tell she remembered me, too.

"I'm sorry about your sister," she said kindly. "Can I get you anything?"

I shook my head. "No. There's nothing I want..." Except my sister back, but that was out of her hands. I was silent for a moment, and she turned to leave, but I called out for her to wait. "Actually...could you tell me who my sister's power of attorney is? She said once she was thinking of changing it to me, but I don't know if she ever did..." I was holding it together extremely well, but I wasn't really feeling...anything. I felt numb, detached from the situation, like I couldn't tell if it was really happening, or if it was really me it was happening to. Was I dreaming? I wasn't even sure...

"Sure," the nurse said softly. "I'll go check for you. I'll be right back."

I almost snorted, but refrained. I worked in health care myself; I knew that when a nurse said 'I'll be right back' it wasn't often the case. Staring at my sister's face, I felt my eyes grow hot with tears again, but they didn't fall.

"Why?" I whispered. There was no answer, and I turned my gaze upwards, glaring at the ceiling as though God were behind it, laughing at me, mocking my pain. As if he were saying, _Ha ha, serves you right. And here you thought I didn't exist. Well, looks like the joke's on you!_

A minute later, the nurse came back in, again knocking softly before she entered. It made me angry, but only because she was doing the right thing, so I couldn't even yell at her for not knocking and not giving me my privacy. My anger was so misplaced, but only because there was nothing tangible to be angry at-death is a miserable thing, but one cannot yell at death, because death is not a person, it only takes people away.

"Sophie?" she said in that same soft, sympathetic voice. "You were right, you are her power of attorney."

Hearing her, I took a deep, shuddering breath, exhaling slowly.

"Then as her power of attorney...please take my sister off life support. She's not coming back."

She hesitated. "Are you sure you don't want to leave her on life support long enough for the rest of your family to say goodbye?"

I closed my eyes and massaged my forehead, feeling a headache coming on. I felt emotionally drained; I just wanted to go home and sleep for a week. In less than half an hour, I had gone from feeling extremely happy about life to feeling angry, depressed, and overwhelmed.

"...I'm sure," I said, already decided. "She's brain-dead. The machine is moving her lungs, she's not even breathing by herself. She's already gone. At this point, even if our parents came to say goodbye while she's on life support...it would be no different from saying goodbye to her corpse." The tears finally spilled over. "She's dead. Being hooked up to a machine doesn't change that fact."

The nurse nodded, expression sad. "I understand. We'll take her off, then."

I just nodded, wiping my eyes with the back of my hand. I quickly left the room, unable to stand there staring at her pallid face anymore, her artificially moving chest that almost fooled my mind into thinking she was just sleeping when she wasn't at all. I exited the building and climbed into my rental car, putting the key in the ignition but not turning it. Instead, I leaned my forehead against the steering wheel, and just let myself cry.

The service was terrible. I hated it. The preacher said only good things about Amber that were so vague he could've been talking about just about anyone and it could've been true. He never so much as mentioned any of the things that truly made her, well, her. He never mentioned her stupid laugh or the way she would whine at you in a high-pitched voice until you gave in to what she wanted or how she would make the lamest jokes you'd ever heard and actually think they were extremely hilarious. I clutched Abed's and Britta's hands throughout the service, feeling like if I let go of them for a moment, I might lose them, too, and there was no way I could handle that at the time.

As they played the final song, _Snowbird_ by Catherine MacLellan and The Good Lovelies, while the pallbearers carried the coffin out to the hearse, I could feel the tears trickle down my cheeks, stinging my eyes which were already sore from near-constant crying. I was sure I looked terrible, but I was past the point where I didn't care, because it just didn't seem to matter anymore. Nothing seemed to matter anymore, except for the two hands clasped tightly in mine that kept me tethered to reality.

My parents shuffled out of the church, my mother, much like myself, sniffling quietly with a steady stream of tears dripping down her cheeks. She didn't bother to wipe them, else I have no doubts that she would have long since run out of tissues dry enough to use. My father, on the other hand, would blow his nose loudly and occasionally give a very loud, sorrowful hiccup that seemed to shake him to the core, like he was gasping for breath so he could live, but just living caused him pain.

It seemed so very accurate as to how I felt, but as I had been Amber's sister and friend but never her parent, I imagined that the pain my parents felt at her loss, though I was sure it could not possibly be any deeper than mine, was most certainly of a different kind altogether.

"Sophie," Britta whispered, as though if she was afraid to speak too loud. Perhaps she thought if she spoke too loud, I might break. But if that was what she was afraid of, she was already too late. "Sophie, you need to go...your family is going to the graveyard to continue the ceremony."

I drew in a deep, shuddering breath. I was extremely reluctant to let go of my friends' hands. They were what had kept me sane over the past few days leading up to the funeral. Hell, they were what had kept me sane even _before _my sister had left me. I had damn near drowned in my loneliness, married to my work and my material goods trying to fill a hole that could only be filled by having real relationships with real people. That was exactly what these people had given me, and in that moment, I was desperate for that. I needed to know that I wasn't in this alone; that there were people who supported me, not just because I was family by blood, but because they chose to be my family through friendship.

Slowly, I unclenched my hands, finding when I released Abed and Britta's hands that I had been cutting off the blood flow to their fingers. Sheepishly, I muttered a quick "sorry" before moving to follow my parents with our extended family following us out to the cars so we could follow the hearse to the graveyard.

The moment we stepped outside, there was a myriad of flashes going off, local reporters having gotten wind of my sister's funeral even though we had tried to keep it private. My vision went red as I wondered which of my sister's own relatives or friends had selfishly sold her out in death. Was nothing sacred? The reporters swarmed us, pushing in close enough that we had trouble moving towards the cars unless we sort of shoved them back. One reporter in specific shoved his microphone right in my face, shouting questions at me to be heard over the rest of the people clambering for interviews.

"Excuse me, you're Amber Lynn's younger sister, correct?"

Still fuelled by rage, I gave the fakest smile and stopped walking. "That is correct. Why do you ask?"

"I'm with We Magazine, how do you feel about your sister's death?"

Cutting a glare at him, I said, "Terrible. How else am I supposed to feel? She's my goddamn sister," I seethed. "But you know what would make me feel better?"

Either he was stupid or curious, or some combination of the two, but he asked, "What's that?"

I didn't answer, instead letting my fist do the talking as it connected solidly with his face. He stumbled back, dropping his microphone as he clutched his bleeding nose. I hoped it was broken.

"You people are all sick, trying to profit off of someone's death! Can't you let us mourn for _one fucking day_ in peace!?" I screamed as my parents grabbed me by the arms and dragged me towards the car and forced me in the passenger side as the rest of the reporters, in a bit of shock, helped their fellow man up, holding back from following the funeral procession. Good, I thought, hopefully they'll leave us alone for the graveside ceremony at least. As we drove away, I saw the study group standing in the entryway of the church, looking surprised. This sobered me up, and I realized I had done something completely out of character and, truthfully, unacceptable despite the fact that the reporters' presence at the funeral was also unacceptable. I could possibly get slapped with a lawsuit. I groaned and leaned my forehead against the cool window.

My mother leaned forward in her place in the backseat and gently placed her hand on my arm.

"No matter what happens, I'm proud of you, dear," she said tearfully. "You stood up for your sister's integrity. There's nothing wrong with that." She glanced at my dad with a look I'd never seen before, but quickly looked away again before I could decipher what it meant. I placed my hand over hers, seeking comfort in its warmth.

"Thanks, mom," I said. Silence fell over the three of us as my dad drove, seeming completely focused on the road and nothing else. "I'm sorry."

"For what, dear?" she said, her voice soft, like her hand was.

"For taking her off life support. You didn't even get to say goodbye." My eyes stung, but no tears fell. Maybe I had finally used them all up.

"She wasn't even there for us to say goodbye to at that point. You did the right thing, Sophie," she said, giving my hand a squeeze before gently extracting her hand from mine. In a moment of panic, I thought she was pulling away from me in spite, but as I glanced, wide-eyed with hurt, at my mother's reflection in the mirror, I saw that she was simply fishing in her purse for a tissue as she had started crying again. However, before I glanced away, I saw my mother shoot a sidelong glare at my dad.

I had never put much faith in God, let alone in prayer, but in that moment I folded my hands in my lap and thought, hoping God could hear me, _Please let this family get through this intact._


	9. With Hope

**Chapter Nine:**

**"WITH HOPE"  
**

* * *

"Abed...do you realize that now that it's November, it's officially been over five months since the last time we saw Sophie?" Troy asked as they sat on the couch, rewatching the Kickpuncher movies.

"Yeah," Abed said between bites of Lucky Charms.

"So...?" Troy looked over at Abed, one eyebrow raised.

Abed kept his gaze on the TV. "So what?"

Troy shrugged. "I dunno. Don't you miss her? I mean, I know _I'm_ your best friend and all, but you were pretty close to Sophie, too. And I thought you said you liked her, even."

It was Abed's turn to shrug. "I did. I still do."

Troy turned to fully face Abed. "Whoa, wait a minute. If you still _like _her, then why the heck haven't you even _texted_ her?"

Abed finally glanced over at Troy for a second. "I did. She didn't answer."

Troy gave him an 'are-you-serious' look. "One text? Just _one text?_"

"Yeah. But last time she didn't respond to me she eventually apologized and said next time she wasn't going to respond she would let me know. If she's going to spontaneously act like this a lot, I don't think we'd be compatible after all. I don't take well to spontaneity when it comes to emotional factors. I can't tell what she might be feeling to make her not want to talk to me. I understand from what I found on the internet that some people need space from others after they lose a loved one, but like you said, it's been over five months, and I just don't understand what could possibly be keeping her from talking to us."

"Well...I know Britta's been texting her a lot. I don't know if she's gotten a response, but...it'd be worth checking, right?"

"No."

"Um..._what?_" Troy asked, staring at Abed wide-eyed.

"I said no," Abed replied, as though it were no big deal. "If Sophie wants to talk to me, she'll talk to me. I'm not going to force her to."

"It's not forcing her to talk to you if you just send her a text asking what she's been up to the past several months."

Finally, Abed turned his head to face Troy, placing a hand on his best friend's shoulder.

"Troy." He paused. "This is my choice."

Troy gave a deep sigh at his friend's unwillingness to pursue his own potential happiness. That was just like Abed, though-he didn't force people to stay with him if they didn't want to. He was too used to people eventually getting tired of him and just... leaving. And that was exactly what he had thought Sophie would never do when they first met her. She had actually seemed genuinely interested in being Abed's friend, and perhaps, he had thought, even more than that. But he had been wrong before, he thought, and he likely would be again. He would just have to make sure the next girl Abed liked was truly as worthy of his affection as he had hoped Sophie would have been...

* * *

After my sister's death, the rest of my family had disintegrated like sugar in water. Over the summer months, my mother and father had started living apart, both moving to different parts of the state, saying that they wanted fresh starts where there wouldn't be so many painful reminders of the not-so-distant past. I almost wanted to ask them, And what of me? Am I just another reminder you don't want to see because I look too much like my sister? I bit my tongue, however, and let each of them go. I was their daughter, but that didn't mean I could make them stay, much in the same way as I couldn't keep them from filing for a divorce.

I took to working as much as I possibly could, which, especially seeing as those with part- or full-time positions were in the midst of taking their summer breaks, was pretty much every day. By the time October rolled around, I was no longer working every day, instead working my usual preferred five-day week. However, I was suppressing my emotions by focusing on work and had taken to doing costume commissions on the side via the internet (as though there weren't enough people doing that already). By early December, though, I was just feeling burnt out. After my sister had died, I hadn't felt like doing anything but working, and had even stopped going to my therapist, which, looking back, was the stupidest decision I could have made at that time.

I pulled out my phone and sent a text off to Britta, the only person I had really texted from the group since the funeral, seeing as she was the only person who had been persistent enough to continuously text me until I finally gave up trying to ignore her and responded. She had been trying to help me get back to "normal", or in other words, trying to get me to socialize outside of work again. Heavens knew my coworkers had failed on that front. They had been kind, but their idea of a night out was going to the bar, which I had done once, but got so drunk I literally couldn't see straight and promptly resolved never to do that again. Between the unbelievable hangover I had the next day and the fact that I didn't want to start drinking regularly like my mom reported my dad had since Amber's death, I knew I didn't want to fall prey to the temptations of alcohol.

_I know it's been a while since I talked to the group but I'd like it if you all came over sometime so we could hang out again, _I texted to Britta.

It wasn't long before I got a response from her-glancing at the clock, I realized it was 3:45, and the study group would all be in the study room studying...well, gathering together under the pretence of studying, anyways.

**Sure thing. I'll find out when everyone's available. Stay strong.**

I smiled faintly. She had been ending every one of her texts to me like that. _Stay strong._ It was both saddening and encouraging. Saddening, because it reminded me of why I needed to stay strong in the first place, but also encouraging, because despite all the walls I had put up between myself and my friends, Britta had stayed on my side the whole time.

_Thank you, Britta. You're a good friend._

* * *

"Hah! See that? _I'm a good friend!_" Britta whooped and proceeded to dance in her seat.

"Shut up, Britta. You're the worst," Jeff said without looking up from his phone.

"You're just jealous because I'm a _good friend_," she said, sticking out her tongue at him.

"That doesn't even make any sense!"

"Neither does your _face._"

* * *

My phone buzzed, indicating another text from Britta.

**How does next week sound? We can come over Friday after classes are done and have one final get-together as a group before winter holidays.**

I smiled at my phone.

_Sounds good. Thanks again, Britta. Looking forward to it._

I promptly sprawled out on the couch, wondering whether all of this was even worth it. Look at where I am, I thought, looking around at the decor of my living room. I had gadgets and gizmos galore, but what was it all worth? Nothing, that's what. Because I didn't have a single person to share it with. Sure, my mom had tried to stay in touch with me after she moved away, more than my dad had done, but even she had eventually stopped talking to me due to my blocking her at every turn when she tried to start a conversation, be it through e-mail or on the phone or whatever. The last message I had gotten from her was a short little e-mail that basically read more like a postcard or even a diary entry than an actual email.

**Had a good day today. Finally got a job, working at the bank. Adopted a kitten from the pound, his name is Neil, after Neil Young. What a man! I've always loved his music.**

It had continued on for a bit, stating things but never asking questions, not even a courteous 'how have you been'. And now that Christmas was fast approaching and I was no longer working all the time and had no one to spend the holidays with, I had been clinging onto the hope of perhaps some members of the study group letting me spend Christmas with them. Now that I had quit working all the time and was back to spending more time at home, I had realized just how terribly large and empty my house was for just one person.

Folding my hands over my stomach, I gave a deep, drawn-out sigh as I stared at the ceiling from where I lay on the couch. If I were to be completely honest with myself, I would have to admit that more than any of the other members of the study group, I missed Abed the most. Being that he was the first person out of all of them that had made any effort to befriend me, and honestly had been the only one aside from Britta who'd made an earnest effort to spend time with me aside from whenever I invited the group as a whole over for dinner, it was completely understandable. However, as time had passed while I had confined myself to a self-induced life of solitude, I had realized more and more that I missed him, and...well, possibly as more than a friend. I had genuinely started to like Abed, and not just the idea of liking someone. He was witty, entertaining, full of surprises (like being able to dance so well), had similar interests to mine, and unless I'd been somehow mistaken, we had seemed to really get along during the relatively short time we'd been friends. Despite that he had trouble distinguishing social cues and often compared real life to pop culture in order to help him with such, I realized that, in truth...well, I liked the guy. Groaning at the realization, I flung my arm over my eyes.

"I am officially doomed."

* * *

Dinner with the study group was much the same as it had been before the summer, and I felt almost as though I had never stopped talking to them. It was...so odd, to me, to think that so much had changed for me since then, but yet this one thing had remained the same to the point where it almost made me feel as though maybe I had only imagined the changes that had happened since summertime; maybe they had all just been a bad dream. As we were sitting at the table, I actually pinched myself, just to reassure myself that yes, this was real, and yes, bad things had happened to me and despite that it was nice to enjoy myself, it wasn't something I could simply forget just like that.

One thing that had changed, however, was actually Abed. It was strange. He had been the one person I had expected never to change, and yet here he was, behaving differently from the last time I had seen him. The change wasn't exceptional, but it was certainly noticeable. After a while of table conversation and eating, I found that I was focusing more and more on the change that had happened in Abed, and was having trouble focusing on the conversations happening around me. Towards the end of the meal, just as Annie and Shirley were helping out by serving up dessert, I turned to Abed, who was almost directly across from me at the table.

"Abed...can I talk to you for a moment?"

Abed finished chewing what was in his mouth, then said, "Sure." However, he stayed sitting where he was, even shoveling another forkful of apple crisp into his mouth. I resisted the urge to smack myself on the forehead.

"Let me rephrase. Abed, can I talk to you for a moment _in the hall?_"

"Oh. Sure," he said, pushing his chair back and following me out to the hall. However, I grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him into my bedroom so I could close the door behind us and, hopefully, prevent all the Nosy Nancies in the dining room from trying to listen in on our conversation.

"Is there a reason we're not in the hall? I'm pretty sure you said you wanted to talk to me in the hall," Abed said, talking a little faster than usual. He seemed almost... uncomfortable? I shook my head.

"Because I know your study group well enough to know that they'll probably try to listen in on our conversation," I said quietly. "So in other words, please lower your voice while we're in here." I fixed him with a serious look, raising an eyebrow. "I wanted to talk to you because I noticed you're acting differently than you used to. And I know, I realize that it's been six months now since the last time we saw each other, but...I just wanted to know that you're okay, I guess. And that the change in you isn't because you hold the fact that I didn't contact you in all those months against me." I gave him a wan smile. "We're still friends...right?"

Abed laughed. "Of course we are. I just didn't want you to feel like I wasn't letting you have your space. When you didn't respond to my text, I figured I should wait until you did to talk to you. And I did. And now that you're talking to me again, I'll never stop bugging you."

It was my turn to laugh. I stepped forward and wrapped Abed in a hug. I thought I felt him tense up a bit, but after a moment he tentatively returned the hug. My cheeks felt warm, and I could feel the biggest grin light up my face.

"Thanks, Abed. I'm sorry I didn't talk to you guys for so long," I mumbled against his shoulder. "I missed you."

He gave me a small squeeze. "Missed you too."

When he didn't end the hug (I figured because he wasn't good with social cues, he wasn't sure when he should end the hug or whether he should let me be the one who did that), I reluctantly pulled back and smiled at him.

"Guess we should go finish our dessert before the apple crisp's all gone, huh?"

Abed nodded. "I do love apple crisp," he said, opening the door and holding it open for me. "After you."

I curtsied. "Why thank you, kind gentleman," I joked.

When we walked back into the dining room, the rest of the group was pointedly ignoring our re-entry, their conversation louder than it had been when we'd left, and I automatically knew they had been trying to listen in on our conversation, just as I'd predicted. I nudged Abed in the side with my elbow and leaned up to whisper in his ear.

"What'd I tell you? They were so trying to listen in," I whispered before I turned to serve up a couple pieces of apple crisp for Abed and myself. When I went to give him the plate of dessert, he was standing there, blinking rapidly. I tilted my head. "...Abed? Is something wrong?" I asked, somewhat concerned.

"Nope. Noooo. Nothing's wrong. Hey, we should watch some terrible Christmas movies if you have any," he said, taking the offered plate and going to rummage through my movie collection. I raised an eyebrow, but shrugged and turned to the group who were all looking at me expectantly now.

My other eyebrow shot up to join the first. "What? You heard the man. To the living room!" I declared, pointing to the living room with my fork. "_For Sparta!_"

* * *

**A/N:** If you've stuck around this far-thank you for reading! And I hope you're enjoying the story. There are only four more chapters left after this, which will carry us almost to the end of January. After that I may upload a couple of the one-shots I've written of Abed and Sophie in the dreamatorium, depending on if y'all are interested in that sort of thing. Let me know via review or message if you are.

See you next Monday!


	10. Stars and Satellites

**Chapter Ten:  
**

**"STARS AND SATELLITES"  
**

* * *

**You should come down to New Fluffytown and help Troy and I build our pillow fort. It's your day off, right?**

I raised an eyebrow at the text I'd just received from Abed. A pillow fort, eh? Well, it certainly sounded like a comfortable enough way to spend a day off. I took a sip of hot chocolate before sending off a reply.

_Yeah, how did you know? And is Craig aware you're building a pillow fort instead of going to class? As long as he's fine with it and I can stay in my pyjamas, I don't mind coming down to help._

My phone buzzed a few seconds later. Damn, but that boy could text quickly.

**I noticed on your calendar last time we were over that you usually take Mondays and Tuesdays off. The Dean is cool with the fort, don't worry about it. And everyone else here is in their pajamas, so you'll fit right in. Could you actually bring us some hot chocolate while you're at it?**

I laughed out loud at that. What were the chances?

_Consider it done._

A few minutes later, I had my coat over my pyjamas and two travel mugs of hot chocolate made with milk set in the cup holders of my car and was off to Greendale Community College.

"Well, nobody can say I didn't do something relatively spontaneous this week," I mused to myself as I drove.

* * *

"Mmm. Thanks, Sophie. You make a mean hot chocolate," Troy said.

"Actually I'd say it's quite nice," Abed said, wiggling his eyebrows at him.

I rolled my eyes at the two of them. "Whatever you say, guys. Now...what is the secret to this pillow-stacking?" I asked, somewhat irked as the same stack I had been trying to build up for the last four minutes fell over _yet again_.

"You have to put the small pillows in the middle. It gives it more stability," Abed pointed out as he sipped at his hot chocolate.

I took his advice and, finally, the stack remained steady even after I'd built it up to the same height as the wall of pillows around it. "Huzzah!" I cried out triumphantly. "Eat _that_, you noncompliant pillows!" When I looked over at Abed and Troy, Abed was making a 'cuckoo' sign to Troy while Troy nodded. I glared at them. "Hey! Just because I talk to pillows doesn't mean I'm crazy. The pillows were making fun of me!" I huffed indignantly.

"Suuure they were," Troy said, and he and Abed grinned and clinked their mugs together.

I gave them both an unimpressed look. "Drink that hot chocolate while you still can, because if you keep throwing insults in my general direction, it'll be the last hot chocolate I ever give you," I said darkly.

Abed started whistling innocently, avoiding my gaze, and Troy put on his best angelic expression and said, "Burns? What burns? Were you cooking?"

"Har har, Troy. You're reeeal funny," I said, starting another stack of pillows.

"Seriously, though. It's great to have you here. I mean, we end up doing a lot of crazy-slash-awesome things here at the college, but since you don't go to school here, you're hardly ever involved in them, and it's nice to have you here for once. Right, Abed?"

Abed looked anywhere but at me, but responded, "Yeah." He quickly turned his attention to a bundle of pillows and started stacking them like I had been doing.

"Say, you have another day off tomorrow, right? Seeing as tomorrow's Tuesday and all," Troy said in a somewhat sneaky way, as though he were leading up to something. I narrowed my eyes at him suspiciously.

"Yeeees... why?" I asked, wariness evident in my voice.

"Oh no reason, we were just thinking we'd stay overnight in New Fluffytown to make sure no one tries to vandalize it or anything. We just think it'd be terrible if we worked so hard on something this big only to go home for the night and come back to find it in ruins."

I raised my eyebrows a bit and nodded. "Yeah, I guess I can understand that. And I'm fine with that, but if we're all going to be staying here overnight, then I'm going to go make a food run," I said, checking my watch. "And no wonder I'm hungry, it's almost six o'clock already. Geez! Time flies, huh? What do you guys want?"

Troy said "Denny's," at the same time Abed said "IHOP."

I grinned. "Well, breakfast for supper it is. Coin flip to decide which place?"

"Sounds fair enough. Make sure you flip the coin, catch it, and then flip it to the opposite side. Just so we don't get in an argument about how the flip should've been performed and have to do it all over again," Abed instructed.

I gave him a two-finger salute. "Aye-aye, cap'n," I replied, pulling a quarter out of my jacket pocket to flip. "Who calls what?"

"Heads," they both called at the same time. They caught each other in a stare-down, not looking away until finally Troy said, sounding somewhat put-out, "Okay, I'll take tails."

"Got it. Abed calls heads, Troy calls tails," I repeated, and they nodded confirmation. I flipped the coin, and lifted an eyebrow when I saw the intense stares Abed and Troy were giving the coin as it flipped end over end to land once again in my palm. I quickly closed my hand and slapped the coin opposite side down on the back of my other hand. Taking my other hand away revealed it to be,

"...Heads! IHOP it is," I said. "Write down a couple of your preferences and I'll see what I can do. Sorry, Troy; better luck next time."

Abed whooped and quickly went to hunt down a piece of paper for them to write down their preferences on. Troy pulled a Darth Vader and yelled, "_Noooo!_"

I sighed and stood up, patting Troy on the head as I followed Abed, as he'd run off before I could even tell him that I actually had a scrap piece of paper and a pen in my jacket pocket that he could've used.

* * *

"Okay, boys, I brought breakfast...er, supper. Brupper? Whatever the heck you wanna call it, I brought it," I said, handing them the take-out containers that I had marked with their respective names. "And if you can't finish it, I will not hesitate to devour any leftovers, so if you want to save them for breakfast or something make sure they are kept somewhere I will never think to look for them," I warned them, with good reason. I loved all things breakfast-related. Especially waffles and pancakes. Carbs had always been my favorite weakness.

"Thanks, Sophie. You're the best," Troy said with a goofy grin on his face as he opened his container full of blueberry syrup-topped waffles. Abed shot him an indecipherable look and also took his, which held an extra large stack of traditional buttermilk pancakes with little containers of the IHOP's pancake syrup and blackberry jam, as per his request, so he could put as much on the pancakes as he wanted. I raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment on the look which I wasn't sure if I had been intended to witness. Unsure, I shrugged slightly to myself and sat down cross-legged on a pillow like Troy and Abed were and opened my own container of Swedish crepes.

"Oh golly, I think I've died and gone to heaven," I said as the aroma of the lingonberry sauce tickled my senses. "Don't pinch me if I'm dreaming. I love food dreams and would be quite happy to live in one forever. Just as long as it doesn't turn into a food nightmare, that is."

"True. Food nightmares are never good. Once I had a nightmare that the ham in our fridge was so far past its due date that the mould it had grown had become self-aware and made the ham into a zombie ham that had a taste for human flesh. And then it ate Pierce," Troy said, a look of vague horror on his face. "The next day I had almost forgotten the dream until I opened the fridge and saw the mouldy ham sitting there...staring at me..." He cleared his throat. "Needless to say, I got Abed to throw it out...the window."

"It landed in some lady's plant pot," Abed remarked casually, as though that sort of thing happened every day. It made me wonder just what exactly the everyday norm was for Abed and Troy in their apartment.

After that, we spent the majority of the meal in silence, with the exception of the random noise of approval which we eventually had a sort of unspoken contest going on for, about who could make the loudest one. The only thing that eventually stopped it was when Jeff passed by the entrance to the pillow fort where we had been sitting and stared at us for a long moment before speaking.

"Would you three stop that already? It sounds like you're having some sort of orgy in here. _God!_" he said before he started walking away, going back the same way he had come from.

There was a moment of silence before I called out at Jeff's retreating back, "You're just jealous because you weren't invited!" When he gave no response, I turned back to Abed and Troy and said, "He's totally jealous."

"I know I would be if my friends were having brupper without me," Troy said. "By the way, brupper of supfast?"

"Brupper," Abed and I both said straight-faced.

"Darn. I thought maybe supfast would've caught on by now..."

"Sorry, Troy, but I think the term brupper has been around longer. That and personally, I think it's catchier," I said with a grin, setting aside my now-empty take-out container. "So, guys...throw out the trash and then back to work on the fort? How much are we planning to get done by bedtime? Or better yet, when are we even planning on turning in?"

Abed and Troy glanced at each other.

"I dunno. We should probably turn in by no later than midnight due to classes starting at 8:30, so accounting for the people who come to the college early for students' association work or the like, there'll probably start to be some commotion around 7:30 or so in the morning," Abed reasoned. "Also, I think we should be able to get to the end of this hallway and start branching off to either side by the time we call it a night. Then we can watch a couple _Inspector Spacetime_ reruns in the fort to double the epicosity of the fact that we'll be sleeping inside a giant pillow fort," he said, really seeming excited for the prospect. The excitement felt somewhat contagious.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" I asked, eager to watch _Inspector Spacetime_ with them. I actually hadn't heard of it until after I'd met Abed, at which point we'd started discussing the episodes as I watched them, if we weren't watching the episodes together. "Let's build this baby!"

* * *

_"Blimey, Inspector! Where on earth are we?"_

_"Don't you mean..._when_ are we, Constable...?"_

"Arrrgh! No! That was a terrible place to end off. One more episode!" I said, stretching towards the TV Abed had found wherever the heck he finds awesome things (probably from the AV club, but I liked to think he had cooler-slash-more mysterious sources than that) and snuck into the pillow fort for us to watch _Inspector Spacetime_ on, but not actually moving to press the buttons because I was honestly too lazy to do that. "Ughh. Abed, play the next episodeee," I whined, trying to annoy him into complying.

"Nope. You said that at the end of last episode. We already watched one more than we were going to, and it's past midnight now. We want to be up early enough to beat the early birds tomorrow, remember?" He had a point there.

"I will not concede to remembering any such thing as I am a woman and therefore am perpetually right. Seriously, Abed, has no one ever taught you that?" I grinned cheekily.

"Don't answer, Abed, it's a trick question," Troy said, staring at me warily. "Also, don't look into her eyes. Her hair has gotten to the point where I think she might be a gorgon."

I scoffed in offense. "It has not! ...Has it?" I quickly dug in my bag that was lying beside me for my compact mirror and hairbrush. When I checked it, I sighed in relief before glaring at Troy. "_Liar._"

Troy whistled innocently.

Abed rolled his eyes. "All jokes aside; Troy, where did we put the sleeping bags? Are they still in the study room?"

"Yup. Tucked under the sofa last I checked."

"'Kay. I'll go grab 'em."

"Oh. _Crap._ Do you guys have one for me too, by any chance? I kind of forgot to bring a sleeping bag...I have a blanket in my car, but it's not very thick..."

"Oh...no, we only brought the two." Abed frowned. "I guess I should've thought to include that in the text, huh."

"That's okay. Abed would be happy to share his sleeping bag with you, Sophie. _Right, Abed?_" Troy said.

I looked at Abed, who opened his mouth to say something before looking in Troy's direction, where movement caught my eye, and I turned my head to see Troy quickly put his hands behind his back as he looked everywhere but at me with an all-too-innocent expression on his face. I raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment, because inwardly, I felt a sort of joy at the prospect of getting to share a sleeping bag with Abed.

"Sure," Abed said after a moment of somewhat awkward silence between the three of us. I smiled.

"Thanks a bunch, Abed. You're a lifesaver."

For a second I thought I saw him blush, but he quickly turned and headed off, crawling down the tunnel of the pillow fort that led off towards the study room to grab the sleeping bags for us all.

While he was away, Troy and I busied ourselves by putting together a mass of pillows we had yet to use for extending the fort in order for us to sleep on.

"You don't twitch in your sleep or anything, do you?" Troy asked out of the blue.

"Nope. My sister used to tell me I slept like a log. I wouldn't move even if she tried tickling me with feathers or poking me in the sides," I said, mood dampening at the mention of my sister.

Troy paused in what he was doing for a moment to give me a one-armed hug. "Sorry, Soph. Didn't mean to bring it up," he murmured, but I waved off his apology. I couldn't wallow forever, and I was all too aware of that. Despite the sadness it brought me, I had to learn to cope with not having my sister around anymore, because I knew she would want me to be able to move on. That was the only reason I was trying to in the first place.

"It's okay, Troy. I'll be okay in time. Thank you, though."

Only a moment after Troy released me from the hug, Abed came shuffling around the corner with the two sleeping bags. Troy quickly crawled over to him while I finished fixing the pillow pile. I heard them whispering, but couldn't quite make it out, which piqued my curiosity, but before I could decide whether or not I was nosy enough to shuffle ever-so-slightly closer to them to try and make out what they were saying, they both shuffled back over, Troy setting up his sleeping bag on the far side of the pillow pile and Abed unzipping his all the way so it would work more like a blanket. I was about to shuffle into the middle of the pile, wanting to get the best spot, when Abed crawled in and flopped down on the middle of the pile instead, wordlessly claiming it for himself. I rolled my eyes, but relinquished my hopes for the middle since I wasn't feeling mean enough to try and bribe or bully him out of 'his' spot. Crawling over and lying down beside him on the opposite end of the pillow pile from Troy, I smiled contentedly when Abed pulled the warm sleeping bag over the both of us, finally feeling how tired I was as my eyes started to close of their own accord when Troy clicked off the lamp next to his head, the last source of light that had been left on inside the fort.

"Sophie?" I heard Abed murmur quietly.

"Yeah?" I mumbled sleepily back.

"Can I see your hand for a second?"

Somewhat confused, I complied anyways, bringing my hand up towards where I could make out the outline of Abed's face. I was a bit surprised when his own hand came up to grasp mine, but then I smiled and was very glad it was dark, because I could feel my face burning, which told me I must've been blushing crimson.

"Goodnight, Sophie," Abed said. "Sweet dreams."

I stroked the back of his hand with my thumb. "Sweet dreams, Abed."

* * *

**A/N:** Sorry this chapter is a day late... I completely lost track of what day of the week it was! (Seriously I am not even kidding.) Next week's update should be on time as usual on Monday.

Thank you to those of you who have subscribed, favorited, and/or reviewed. Your support is appreciated and I'm glad you enjoy the story!


	11. Last Man Standing

**Chapter Eleven:**

**"LAST MAN STANDING"  
**

* * *

The next morning, I woke up slowly, suspended for an undeterminable length of time in that restful state somewhere between sleep and waking where you find yourself vaguely aware of what's going on around you, but unable to focus on it because it's just too damn hard to open your eyes. There were hushed voices speaking to one another, sounding as though they were on the other side of a tunnel.

"...think...should wake her up...?"

"Nah...needs her sleep...looks kind of cute...sleeping."

I felt as though I was slowly drifting towards consciousness as the snatches of conversation that I actually comprehended became more and more frequent, but what finally made me snap my eyes open was a voice yelling what sounded like directly next to my ear.

"Yoohoo! I thought you guys might like my special scrambled _Dean-light_!"

Now, let me tell you, ever since I became a teenager, I had been the number one crankiest person in the morning. Even (and especially) my parents had referred to me in the past as being 'literally dangerous' to wake up, which was why I always had my alarm clock all the way across the room from me, set at the highest volume it would go at, because if it were any closer I feared I might actually break it in my morning rage. One time when we had had some extended family over (one of my mom's cousins' family), their kids had actually wanted to wake me up, but my dad had said to them, and later told me such, "Don't poke the bear." You know, it really says something about you when your own parents think of you as a feral beast capable of ripping off their limbs and beating them with the wet ends. (Not that I actually would. I think.) Nevertheless, this personality was what brought me to the present, not-so-promising situation.

I must have been a scary sight to behold, what with my hair undoubtedly messy enough to pass off as a lion's mane and my eyes bloodshot like they usually seemed to be first thing in the morning. And the first thing I opened my eyes to see was... my uncle Craig, clad in Betty Boop pyjamas. I ground my teeth.

"_You. DARE._"

I would later be informed by Abed and Troy that my voice sounded like I was promising him a 'slow and torturous death'.

"...Whoops. Wait, you invited Sophie to sleep over in the pillow fort, but you told me it wouldn't be ready until tomorrow!" he said to Abed and Troy, putting his hands on his hips. The fact that he was continuing to talk, however, was just adding to my all-consuming rage.

"You. Must. _DIE!_" I shrieked, launching out from beneath the comforter at my uncle, who promptly screamed like a little school girl and crawled as quickly as humanly possible away from me, quickly disappearing around the corner leading off towards the study room. However, after the initial lurch out of my comfortable cocoon, I promptly decided that it wasn't worth leaving the comfortableness of my 'bed' and crawled right back in and closed my eyes with a contented smile on my face now that I could-hopefully-sleep in peace.

Unfortunately, then Abed and Troy started whispering to each other in hushed tones which they must have thought were too quiet for me to hear, but seeing as I was fully awake at that point, I could make out what they were saying quite clearly.

"Dude, did you see the way she just chased the Dean outta here without even really chasing him? She _literally _came at him like a spider monkey!" Troy whispered.

"While I can't help but appreciate the _Talladega Nights_ reference, I don't think the epicness of what just happened can be properly described in words," Abed replied.

I couldn't control myself when I realized that I wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep with them whispering back and forth like that-I flipped out again.

Slowly sitting up, I turned in the direction I'd heard Abed and Troy in and, when I caught sight of them, glared daggers promising death at them.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Sophie...it's us, Troy and Abed-"

I growled, cutting off Troy's rushed defence, only to have my growling cut off by something small hitting me in the forehead. Surprised, I looked down at the thing that had hit me which had fallen in my lap, only to find it was—

"Chocolate?" I said, face lighting up with a grin. "Score! Oh wait, I should have breakfast before I have any sweets..." I reasoned with myself.

"The Dean just brought us some scrambled eggs he made," Abed was quick to point out.

"Ooh. He may be weird, but Big C's always been pretty good when it comes to cooking," I said, quickly crawling over to join Abed and Troy where they sat with the container of scrambled eggs and plastic plates and utensils set between them. I rubbed my hands together. "So, who's serving it all up?"

Abed and Troy looked at each other, then Abed shrugged and Troy rolled his eyes in response.

"Oh come on guys, quit communicating without talking, sheesh," I said, designating myself to serve up the food.

"Can't help it," Abed said.

"Yeah, it just happens naturally," Troy continued.

"Natural, my butt. You guys totally made up your own meanings for things like shrugging and eye-rolling," I argued.

We continued arguing until it melded into joking and laughing and, eventually, we started back up on building the fort, eventually enlisting the help of other students as they arrived at the college. The building of New Fluffytown was once again underway.

* * *

Due to the fairly monotonous work of pillow fort building, I had volunteered myself to go home before lunchtime and cook up lunch for Abed, Troy, and the rest of the study group. I had whipped up a pile of grilled cheese sandwiches and a large pot of homemade creamy carrot soup, but it had been fairly time-consuming and had killed a good hour and a half, so by the time I was heading back to the college it was already well past noon, and I hoped that none of them had gone back to class yet or were getting impatient waiting for their food-after all, I _had_ given them fair warning that it might be a while. With a satisfied sigh as I finished blending the carrot soup to a smooth consistency, I put it in a large air-tight container and made sure to pack a ladle along with all of the disposable plates, bowls, and cutlery when I piled everything carefully into my car, with the food on the floor so it couldn't fall off the seat if I stopped suddenly or anything like that.

My drive back to the college was slow; unhurried; even, dare I say, somewhat relaxing.

However, when I arrived back at the campus, it was to a scene that was anything but.

Even before I set foot inside the main doors, I felt an ominous sense of foreboding settle over me. And I was justified in feeling it when I opened the doors to find feathers strewn everywhere and furniture knocked over. I furrowed my brow, hoping this wasn't what I thought it was, because if I knew anything from what Britta had told me about the college-wide paintball wars they had had at Greendale before, a college-wide pillow fight could definitely be taken _much_ more seriously than it should be.

Taking my armfuls of food and whatnot with me, I decided that rather than go through a possible war zone to try and find Abed and Troy and likely get the food knocked out of my hand and spilled-or worse, taken by people it wasn't meant for and eaten-I decided to take a shortcut to find someone that, despite not exactly being someone I got along with (and I assure you, the feeling was mutual), could make sure I got to Craig's office without incident.

When I entered the correct (thankfully vacant) hallway, the only people there were two twelve-year-old munchkins, and I quickly strode up to them.

"Hey. Is Chang in?" I asked, trying not to let my irritation of having to go through the munchkins show on my face.

The one on the right side of the door with the overgrown-looking teeth eyed the stockpile of food I was carrying in my arms. "That depends, did you bring lunch for us?" he said, reaching out for it.

"Nuh-uh-uh," I said, holding it out of his reach. "I only give it to Chang. I need to talk to him anyways. So is he in or not?"

"Yeah," he said grudgingly, glaring at me as he opened the door they were guarding. "Wait here."

When he was gone, I raised an eyebrow at the other kid. "He always that bossy?"

He just shrugged in response.

"Hm."

Only a moment later, the door burst open, just about smacking the poor kid in the face if he hadn't jumped out of the way just in the nick of time. Chang stepped out in what he probably thought was a really dramatic fashion. Unfortunately for him, it was ruined by the fact that he was scratching his nose in such a way that it really looked like he was picking it... gross.

Then again, that's Chang for you, I guess.

"Sophie," he said, eyes slightly narrowed in suspicion. "What brings you to the Changmeister?"

_Changmeister? Seriously?_ I raised an eyebrow at him but didn't outwardly comment on it.

"I need you and the fun-sized brute squad to take me to the Dean's office. I'm not sure what made the campus look like a war zone but ain't no way I'm foolish enough to jump headfirst into the situation without knowing what's going on first," I said.

Chang raised an eyebrow. "Oh? And...what's in it for me?" He asked, gaze shifting to the food I was carrying.

"Nuh-uh. This is already spoken for. I can bring you and the shrimps supper in exchange for your help, around six o'clock or so."

He frowned, but nodded at his little helpers, who grabbed up pillows from a stack just inside his office and passed them around so everyone but myself was 'armed'.

"Fine. But I'm holding you to that," he said, pointing his finger so close to my face I had to go cross-eyed just to look at it.

I rolled my eyes. "You know I'm good for my word. Let's just go."

Chang gave me the crazy-eye. "_I_ decide when we go." He paused for a moment as I gave him a weird look, then said, "Okay yeah, we're going."

I swear, if I had to be around Chang every day I'd probably sprain my eyeballs from how much eye-rolling and eye-twitching I did around him.

Once the Dean's office door was in sight, I turned to Chang and nodded my thanks to him.

"I can take it from here, Chang. Thanks for the escort."

He fixed me with a narrow-eyed stare. "Six o'clock. Don't be late." He gestured with his index and middle fingers like he had his eyes on me, and I just stared at him blankly in return. "I expect something _super_ tasty. Taste smorgasboard."

Once again, I had to resist the urge to roll my eyes at him, instead settling for shaking my head. "I'll do my best," I said somewhat blandly, watching the pipsqueak police follow him off back towards his office with a wary gaze. I was never much of one for kids. Which was kind of odd, according to my parents at least, because I would often act kind of childish myself. But in my mind, there's a big difference between acting childish and actually being a child. Well, maybe it's just me. But alas, I digress.

As I approached the door to the Dean's office, it suddenly opened to reveal Troy and Abed leaving the room. As soon as they saw me, they both seemed to perk up a bit.

"Sophie!" Abed said, at the same time Troy said, "Food!" However, they both turned to each other with a glare, which immediately sent little red flags up in my mind. I mean, come on. This is Troy and Abed we're talking about... they _never_ glare at each other. They just... _don't_.

"Only one of us can have Sophie's food," Abed said.

"Right. Rock-paper-scissors-lizard-Spock," Troy agreed, and they both moved to play.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! _Wait_ just a minute," I said forcibly, setting the containers of food down and grabbing their hands so they couldn't finish their game-slash-competition. "What the heck is going on here, and _why _can't you both have my food? Seriously, there's enough here for the whole study group and then some, you don't have to compete for it. You two should know that."

"We're on opposite sides," Abed said. "Troy split off to make a blanket fort and he wants to go for the Guinness record on largest blanket or pillow fort. He's sacrificing quality for quantity. The Dean wants me to destroy my fort so Troy can expand his enough to get the record but I don't see why all my hard work should go to waste just for some silly record."

Troy glared at Abed a bit before saying, "Whatever. There's no talking sense into you. I'm going back to Blanketsburg-the _superior _fort." He turned and sort of marched off, and I watched him go with some concern before turning to Abed.

"Abed...are you sure you want to go on with this? You and Troy are best friends-"

"Not anymore. We're rivals."

"-_best friends_," I stressed, fixing him with a stern look for interrupting me, "and if you let something like this wreck your friendship...well, that would just be really sad, I think." My brow furrowed in concern.

Abed was silent for a moment, staring at the ground. "I don't want to back down, though," he said. "Troy seems to think I can't really do things without him since I'm not very good with social cues, but I'm perfectly fine without him. I managed just fine before I met him, after all."

I shook my head. "I know, Abed. But what I'm trying to say is since you and Troy became friends, you haven't needed to manage without him. You two are good for each other. You...how can I put it? It's like, you two fill a space in each other's lives that you might not have noticed was there before." I sighed. "Well...if you keep on this way, I guess you'll see what I mean anyways." I bent down to collect the containers of food once again. "Say, how about we track down the members of the study group that you are talking to at the moment and have something to eat?"

"I'd like that very much," Abed said, seeming content to be off the topic of his and Troy's "former" friendship. He took some of the food from me to lighten the load and headed off in the opposite direction of where I'd come from. "Follow me to the new and improved Pillowtown."

"You even renamed the fort? Aww, I liked Fluffytown better..."

* * *

**A/N:** Wow, it's so nice to see how people are liking this story! The number of follows, favorites, and reviews I got last chapter were a lot more than I expected considering the number I got for past chapters. There are only a couple more chapters left as I'm finishing the story where season three ends. I have some one-shots of Sophie and Abed in the dreamatorium that I'll be posting once this story is finished, and once season four starts I may consider writing a sequel depending on if people would be interested in one. Make sure to let me know in a review or PM if you would be interested in one. Until then, happy reading, and next chapter will be up next Monday!


	12. Better Than Life

**Chapter Twelve:**

**"BETTER THAN LIFE"  
**

* * *

It was the day that Annie had manipulated Troy and Britta into going to lunch together while Abed showed her how the dreamatorium worked. After Annie had changed the machinations behind it, they had gone through the Greendale Hospital School scenario, during which he had confessed to her that he was afraid of being left alone once everyone felt they had no use for him anymore. After Annie's comforting words and the subsequent Inspector Spacetime scenario they had played out, Annie had made up some grilled cheese for lunch, and they were currently sitting on the couch while eating and watching some old Charlie Brown movies. After a while, Annie set down what remained of her grilled cheese and turned to Abed, hesitating a bit before speaking.

"Abed...when we were in the dreamatorium, you mentioned something," Annie said. "You said that you'd run the scenarios, and that you never got married. But...what about Sophie? I thought you two were really hitting it off. Troy even mentioned you thought you liked her before summer break..."

Abed was quiet for a moment before responding. "You know how I have trouble when it comes to dealing with emotions. Before the funeral, I never had trouble dealing with Sophie because she was always happy, always joking and smiling. She was predictable. Constant. I knew how to deal with her then. But when we went to the funeral, I saw a whole different side of Sophie. I realized that she doesn't always feel happy. And to be honest, it sort of scared me. I realized that I didn't like seeing her unhappy, but because I'd never seen her unhappy before, I had no idea how to make her not be unhappy. And since I didn't want to see her unhappy but I didn't know how to make her happy again, I figured that the only way I would be able to not see her being unhappy was to just not see her at all."

Annie shook her head. "Abed, didn't you read poetry in high school? 'Better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all', you know?" She tsked. "It sounds to me like you really liked her, if not loved her. I think if you had run the scenarios where you two actually got together, you would be surprised at how positive things could be."

Abed twitched a bit, not wanting to think so positively when things could just as well go south. "But what if she rejects me? What if after she finds out I like her she decides she would feel too awkward about it to keep being friends with me?"

Annie gave him a knowing smile. "Trust me, if she's stuck around this long when the entire study group was practically breathing down her neck to begin with to make sure she wasn't going to hurt you, then she _at least_ likes you enough not to let a confession scare her off."

"Oh," Abed said. He was silent for a moment before he furrowed his brow. "Wait...you were harassing her to make sure she wouldn't hurt me? But I was the one that made the effort to induct her into the group."

"Yes, but we just wanted to make sure she wasn't some meaniepants loserface who would try and use you for anything. No offense, Abed, but since you have trouble reading social cues, sometimes you can miss the hints that someone's not a very nice person." She gave him a lopsided smile. "We were just trying to look out for you. I hope you're not mad..."

Abed shook his head. "I'm not mad. I'm actually kind of touched that you guys would do that for me." He paused. "But Sophie's not a bad person. I like her. We get along really well. I just don't like being in a situation where I don't know what I'm supposed to do." He frowned. "And I don't want to mess this up."

Annie grinned. "Would you be willing to accept my help? Because I think I have the perfect plan for how you can confess to Sophie."

Abed raised his eyebrows. When Annie didn't elaborate, he said, "Well, what are you waiting for? I'm all ears!"

* * *

When I got up that morning, it was with surprise that, while drinking my morning coffee and overlooking the front lawn, I noted that the flag on my mailbox was raised. Curiosity niggled at me, as I hadn't ordered anything online, nor was I due to receive any bills for a few days. I wasn't expecting mail from anyone (not that I ever was) and I had a no-flyers rule due to my habit of accumulating them to the point where I could wallpaper entire rooms with them, so it was a mystery to me as to what it could be.

Shrugging on my Batman bathrobe over top of my red and black checked flannel pajamas, I went out to grab the mail, not caring that I wasn't technically dressed yet because it was only seven in the morning, and I knew all my neighbors anyways (not that we ever talked-we just kind of mutually decided we didn't care enough to get to know each other. Lovely neighborhood, huh?).

Shuffling out to the mailbox, I flipped the flag back down and opened the mailbox door. Sure enough, sitting innocently inside of it was a single, standard-size envelope. There was no return address on the front; in fact, not even my own address was written on it. Only my name was written neatly in elegant cursive on the front. So...the person who sent the letter had to have dropped it off by hand? That was...odd, to say the least. I didn't recognize the handwriting, either. Cautious now, I glanced around, not noticing anything suspicious or out of the ordinary nearby, but decided to go inside to open the letter anyways. Just to err on the side of caution.

When I got back inside, I flopped back down onto the loveseat in the sunroom area. Holding the envelope up to the light, I couldn't make out anything but a folded piece of paper-a letter, I supposed. Deeming it safe enough, I cautiously pried the envelope open, trying not to make a mess of it by ripping it to shreds. When I had it open (having failed miserably at trying not to make a mess of it), I drew out the folded letter and delicately unfolded it, pressing the creases back to make it stay open before I even started reading what was written on it.

"You are hereby cordially invited to a masquerade ball at Hawthorne Mansion in two days' time. You will be escorted from the doors to the ballroom. We eagerly anticipate your arrival," I mumbled the words written in the same flowing script that had been on the outside of the envelope. I could feel my eyebrows just about disappear into my hairline. "A masquerade? Who in the world...?" I had never been to a masquerade ball before, although I had always wanted to. It reminded me of my favorite musical, _Phantom of the Opera_. For a moment, I entertained the vague notion that maybe one of my friends was just playing a joke on me, but then I thought, hey, what if it's true? Besides, none of my friends (that I knew of) would pull such an elaborate prank-let alone one using the Hawthorne Mansion. And seeing that it was at the Hawthorne Mansion, it had to be one of the study group. A smile tugged at the corners of my mouth until it was a full-blown grin, and I happily ran to my room and flung open the closet where I had all my costumes (and believe you me, they took up just as much if not more space than my regular clothes did), quickly rifling through them until I drew out my _Phantom of the Opera_ dress from the masquerade ball scene. I took a deep breath as I looked at it; I had only worn it once, for my graduation, although no one had realized what it was from. My grin widened as I drank in the sight of it.

"I really hope you still fit," I said, before racing to try it on just to make sure. After all, the masquerade ball was only two days away.

* * *

Due to the fact that I had never been to Pierce's mansion before, I took a taxi, deciding that seeing as statistically speaking it was likely the study group putting on the masquerade ball, I could always hitch a ride back home afterwards with one of them. As the cabbie drove, the only sound the faint background noise of the radio as he made no effort to make small talk (must have been an off day for him, either that or he was the rare cabbie that actually didn't try to make people tell him their life story, which I was kind of grateful for, being a person who was fairly awkward when it came to talking to strangers), I fiddled with the edge of the white-and-gold lace mask I had chosen for the occasion. Seeing as in the movie, Christine had never actually had a mask on at any point during the masquerade ball scene, I had opted for the kind of mask that attached to a stick so it never actually touched your face directly.

When we pulled up in front of the mansion, I quickly paid the cabbie, leaving him a couple bucks as a tip so I wouldn't have to wait for him to give me my change, and bolted out. I would have run to the front doors in excitement if I hadn't been wearing heels. As it was, though, I was still walking as quickly as I feasibly could without running too high a risk of snapping an ankle and then having to spend my evening in the hospital instead of at the masquerade ball. I was still having trouble believing that the study group could've actually put together a masquerade ball. Or at least one of them had a hand in it. Just before I reached the double doors, they swung open from the inside, and, much to my surprise, there was Jeff, dressed in a Raoul costume.

"Madamoiselle," he said with a little bow and a smirk.

I was shocked. "Whoa. Dressing up isn't your thing, is it, Jeff? At least it wasn't last time I check, unless there's something you haven't been telling me..." I grinned cheekily. "Hey now, my uncle's a cross-dresser, so I won't judge..."

He glowered at me. "Don't even go there, Sophie. And for your information, I was asked to do this, it wasn't my choice."

"It was still your choice to say yes," I mumbled out the side of my mouth, and he glared at me again, but held out his arm for me to take and started leading me off to heavens-knew-where. "So what spurred this masquerade ball to happen?" I asked, trying to act nonchalant even though it was practically eating me alive to not know what was going on.

"Patience, young padawan," Jeff said. "You'll find out in a minute."

I sulked the rest of the way to the ballroom, but didn't push it, seeing as he had a valid point there. It only took us a minute to reach the ballroom, in the span of which I had plenty of time to marvel at just how large Pierce's mansion was. As well as being full of surprisingly tasteful decorations. When I mentioned that to Jeff, he laughed.

"You haven't seen the part that he lives in yet."

A moment later, we reached the tall double doors that I assumed led to the ballroom.

"This is it," Jeff said when we stopped in front of them, confirming my assumptions. There was a large brass door knocker on each door, which seemed kind of silly to me seeing as we were inside, and who needs door knockers on an inside door? Nonetheless, Jeff took hold of one and rapped it loudly against the door three times in succession. He seemed to be counting backwards from twenty under his breath, but just before I was about to ask him what on earth he was doing, he had reached one, and he slowly pushed the doors open. The strains of _Masquerade_ from _Phantom of the Opera_ met my ears, much to my fangirl delight, and there were a number of people dancing on the ballroom floor and coming down the wide staircase that led up to a second level, much like appeared in the movie. Turning to me, Jeff gave a little bow for the second time that night and held out his hand for me to take. I grinned and accepted, and we stepped into a waltz in time with the music.

"Jeff," I said, somewhat surprised, "I never had you pegged as a ballroom dancer. Isn't it a little..._feminine_ for you?" I laughed.

"Please," he said, feigning offense. "Ballroom dancing is an excellent way to meet classy women. After all, the ladies love a man who can dance."

I grinned. "Careful-I may swoon from all that charm you're exuding."

He rolled his eyes. "Please don't. If you do you'll ruin the scene, and then we'll have to do it all over again."

My eyes widened. "_Whoa_. They're acting out the _whole scene?_" I asked, looking around to see that, sure enough, the people dressed in _Phantom of the Opera_ costume were still dancing to the movie's choreography. (With the exception of a couple people standing near the walls drinking punch-I thought I recognized Annie and Shirley in masquerade wear near the doors.)

All of a sudden, the music started to change tempo, slowing down. I immediately tensed up a bit as we drew to a halt due to the change of pace.

"Waaait a minute," I said, eyes narrowing. "We're not expected to _kiss_ like in the movie, now, are we? Because no offense to you, Jeff, but...well okay you kind of are my type. But I only like you in a strictly platonic way."

He smirked. "I understand. It's hard for the ladies to resist the classic Winger charm. I mean, come on. Who can resist this face?"

I gave him a blank look. "When it's smirking like that, I certainly can."

"_Ouch,_ Sophie. You wound me deeply."

"It's okay. Your ego looks like it could use it, otherwise you might have trouble fitting it back through the door on your way out."

"Just pay attention to the performance, Sophie," he muttered, and we turned to watch the dancers progress down the stairwell, using their fans as part of the choreography. I just about had spasmed from how happy my inner fangirl was at that moment. And then, as the music hit a minor note, the cherry on top appeared in the doorway at the top of the stairwell, all of the dancers parting and looking back at him.

There Abed stood, fully decked out in complete Phantom masquerade garb. I swear I just about swooned.

He slowly progressed down the stairs, lip-synching to the Phantom's lines, even tossing a folder full of music down at the feet of the two people dressed up as Andre and Firmin and drawing out a sword at the line, "_Here I bring the finished score - Don Juan Triumphant!_" As Abed's eyes scanned the people present, I felt Jeff take that as his cue to turn and leave. Enraptured with Abed's convincing performance, I didn't even glance back when he left. I had to stifle a giggle when he was picking on the Carlotta actor, ruffling the feathers in her hair with the tip of his sword. After he was done insulting the managers, I froze up when he turned and looked directly at me, even though I had known that it would happen eventually. Inwardly I was fangirling so hard, but outwardly I was afraid I might mess the scene up somehow, and silently prayed that I wouldn't.

"_As for our star... Miss Christine Daae_..." he mouthed along with Gerard Butler's voice, and as the music started to pick up again I nearly swooned for the second time that night, making sure to keep my eyes locked on Abed's as Christine had done with the Phantom. "_No doubt she'll do her best, it's true her voice is good, she knows. Should she wish to excel, she has much still to learn. If pride will let her return to me, her teacher_," the song went on as Abed slowly approached, arms spread wide in a welcoming gesture, "_her teacher_..."

The orchestra began to play without a singer, and I, much like Christine had seemed in the movie, was finding it a little hard to breathe and was incredibly touched at the thought that my friends had made this entire scene come to life just to let me be a part of it. And a key part, at that. Slowly, hesitantly, I stepped towards where Abed, as the Phantom, stood near the bottom of the stairwell, as he stepped towards me as well. I wondered what might happen for the ripping off of Raoul's engagement ring, seeing as I was wearing a necklace, but it certainly didn't have a ring on it, and I didn't really want him to rip it off my neck. That would probably hurt a bit, and I didn't want to wreck the chain as it was one of my favorite necklaces, being an amber necklace my mother had gotten me for my birthday one year. It wasn't exactly something readily replaceable. As I met Abed where he was standing by stepping up onto the bottom stair, I moved my hand to clutch my necklace, furrowing my brow a bit in order to non-verbally let Abed know that I didn't want my necklace wrecked. However, the next second, the music faded out before the part where the Phantom ripped the necklace off could be played, and Abed tilted his head at me.

"Did you like it?" he asked.

I gaped at him. "Did I...!" I face-palmed, though the lace gloves I was wearing dulled the smacking sound it would've otherwise made. "_Did I like it_, he asks. Abed, that was absolutely freaking amazing and I loved every single moment of it. Seeing as we're not enacting the scene anymore I have permission to act out of character, right? Well I guess it's a little late to ask that now anyways seeing as I just face-palmed..." I mumbled.

"Permission granted."

At that, I practically tackled him with a hug. "That is the most amazing, sweetest thing anyone's ever done for me. You are an incredible person, and the only question I have to ask is...who all did you get to agree to _act_ in this thing?"

Abed seemed a little stunned at the sudden show of affection, but after a moment he returned the hug. "Well, most of Troy and Britta's expressive dance class is here, and part of the theatre club is here, too. They were the ones that helped hook us up with the costumes. I can't take full credit for putting this together, though. It was mainly Annie's idea, and she did a lot of the organization and decoration part." He paused for a moment. "Actually, there was something I wanted to ask you, which is why I got her to help me put this together." He pulled back from the hug, although he almost seemed...reluctant? He looked at me seriously (though he didn't show a lot of emotion most of the time, I could tell from his eyes he was being serious).

"Sophie, will you go out with me?"

I dropped the mask I had been holding in my hand that I had all but forgotten during the excitement and intensity of the scene, both hands flying to cover my mouth as it gaped open in shock and wonder. I was breathless and subsequently speechless for what seemed an age, and focused on trying to breathe deeply so I wouldn't end up hyperventilating and passing out. I must have been silent for too long, because Abed's face seemed to fall, almost unnoticeably, but I could tell because of my closeness.

"Sorry. I shouldn't have assumed that-"

"Abed," I interrupted, finally having found my voice, though it came out kind of wobbly at first. I moved so I was standing on the same step as him and, taking his face in between my hands, kissed him full on the mouth.

_"Woohoo!"_

_"Ow, ow! You go girl!"_

_"That's my boy, Abed!"_

I blushed deeply as I broke the kiss and glared at the cat-callers, which I noticed were, in fact, the other members of the study group. "Shut up! Nothing to see here!"

Abed cleared his throat. "So...your answer is...?"

I rolled my eyes, but couldn't help but grin like an idiot.

"_Yes._"

* * *

**A/N:** Yes folks, we have finally reached that point of the story. Only one chapter left now. I hope it lives up to your expectations. Make sure to drop a review off on your way out, and see you next Monday for the finale! Thank you to all those who reviewed last chapter! May you laugh heartily and partake of your favorite food and drink combo this week.

And in response to **safranbrod**, who brought up a good point: I didn't actually cover Sophie's reaction to Annie's moving into the apartment. As such, I shall remedy that in a one-shot once I start posting those, which will be after the next (final) chapter of this story.


	13. Don't Drift Too Far

**Chapter Thirteen: **

**"DON'T DRIFT TOO FAR"**

* * *

It was only yesterday that Troy left for the air-conditioning repair school, but already I could tell Abed felt like he was missing a part of himself. Rather than stay at his, Annie, and Troy's apartment, he had stayed at my place overnight, and I had let him stay in my room with me since he preferred being surrounded by Star Wars memorabilia rather than the non-nerdy color-themed guest bedroom. When I woke, I almost had a heart attack; I guessed Abed had felt lonely sleeping in the fold-out cot and had ended up crawling into bed with me. At least it was a double sized mattress, though. I just wasn't used to waking up to having another person so close to me. I smiled a bit, noting that Abed looked very peaceful and cute when he was sleeping. I realized that I didn't mind having Abed this close first thing in the morning, and promptly blushed at my own thought. Since we had officially become a couple just weeks earlier, I had been trying to keep myself from getting too overenthusiastic about being a couple, because seeing as Abed wasn't exactly the dictionary definition of 'normal' (not that I would've preferred him any other way, but I digress) I still wasn't quite sure what to expect with him since he didn't take social cues well, so things had been going slow. We hadn't even gone any further than hugging in public yet since the night of the masquerade ball. I had to remind myself to have patience with Abed, because I didn't want to rush him into anything that he didn't feel comfortable with and risk scaring him off.

Suppressing a sigh at the somewhat depressing train my thoughts had taken, I rolled over and got out of bed, having to hold onto the bedside table for a moment when I almost fell over from low blood pressure. I closed my eyes and stood still until I felt steadier, then shoved my feet into my Chewbacca slippers and shuffled out of the room to prepare breakfast. It was nice to have someone to cook for; I loved cooking, but never really had much motivation to do it when there was no one but myself to taste the results. Rummaging around in my fridge as quietly as I could to assess my ingredients, I decided on making a breakfast skillet to use up some of the fresh produce I had but otherwise might not use before it went bad.

It wasn't long before I had the ingredients all chopped and sizzling in the pan. I took a deep breath of the delicious smelling mixture and smiled.

"Smells good."

I jumped, holding a hand over my pounding heart. I turned and shot Abed a dirty look.

"Don't sneak up on me when I'm cooking. What if I'd been holding a knife and I flung it at you?"

His lips twitched a bit, and I knew he was trying not to smile. "No, that wouldn't work. The trajectory wouldn't allow for the knife to reach me faster than my reflexes could kick in. I have pretty good reflexes."

I rolled my eyes, but couldn't hold back a smile. "I know you do, Mr. Wayne," I said, turning back to stir the skillet so it wouldn't burn. My eyes widened when Abed's arms wrapped around my waist, and I could feel his face pressed into my shoulder. My face heated up, but then I realized...my shoulder was getting wet. I tried to turn around in Abed's embrace so I could return the hug, but he tightened his hold.

"Don't. Please." His voice was quiet. I'd never known Abed to be quiet. It was...disheartening. I sighed, but relented, moving my free hand to rest on one of his.

"Sorry, Abed. It must be hard."

He didn't make a sound, but the damp patch on my shirt continued to grow.

* * *

It was almost the end of summer, over one year now since my sister had passed, and ever since the day after Troy had left for air conditioner repair school Abed had barely left the apartment, leaving it up to me to visit him as often as work allowed. I wasn't one hundred percent sure what the reason behind his refusing to leave the apartment was, as originally Abed had felt it was too painful to stay in the apartment with all the memories of Troy when Troy wasn't there anymore, but I figured that it had something to do with the shock of his best friend suddenly leaving and his wanting to ensure that what remained of Troy's in the apartment didn't, for whatever reason, get removed from the apartment, thus erasing the last traces of assurance he had that Troy might come back, and he must've figured that if he left at any time the stuff might...well, disappear or something. I wasn't entirely sure since it was Abed's mind, not mine, and he hadn't volunteered any information on his reasoning, but I concluded that that was a fairly good assumption from Abed's behavior towards Troy's stuff, and towards my attempts at getting him to leave the apartment to do stuff with me. (Read: flat-out refusal.)

There were only two days left before Abed, Britta and the rest of the study group had to return to Greendale for their fourth year of college, and I had basically lost all hope that I might actually be able to fill the gaping hole that Troy had left in Abed's life. I knew, deep down, that it was silly for me to have even thought I might be capable of doing so in the first place, due to how close the two had been even before I had met either of them, but it pained me to know that I was not, in fact, the most important person in Abed's life. And, after a while, it had even started to frustrate me. Wrong reaction, I know. But being human, and more importantly being a jealous woman-slash-girlfriend, I...well, I couldn't really help it.

However, the final straw came when we were just sitting at the table in the kitchen of Abed and Annie's apartment.

I had made cheeseburgers and potato smiles, in an attempt to cheer Abed up, because he had told me once that he always had to smile whenever he had potato smiles because he thought it was only polite to smile back at them. However, that night, he simply picked one up, stared at it for a while, then dipped it in the ketchup and ate it. Like a...well, like a _'normal' _person. I frowned, but carried on with eating my supper. I had learned since Troy had left that if Abed didn't talk first, he wasn't likely to respond, and though it made for a fairly uncomfortable, tense silence (on my behalf, at least), I suffered through it like a goddamn martyr.

Then he opened his mouth.

"Troy used to make potato smiles."

And I, being the jealous person I was, snapped.

I slammed down my fork, shoving my chair back and making for the coat rack to pick up my purse and leave. I resolutely kept my mouth shut, not wanting to say anything, because I knew that if I did, what I said would be angry, hurtful, and would leave me feeling ashamed later. I had had too many similar situations pan out with my parents before that left me feeling ashamed of the mean, disrespectful things I had said out of anger, and I certainly didn't want to end up hurting Abed-the person I liked to the point where I was fairly certain I loved him-in the same way.

The fates, however, seemed to be of the opinion that I didn't have much choice in the matter.

"Why are you leaving? You didn't finish your food," Abed called out, having stood up from his seat in order to be able to see what I was doing, but making no move to stop me from leaving.

I took a deep breath, but the words were begging so badly to be said that I just couldn't keep my mouth shut.

"What do you _think,_ Abed?" I said in a harsh tone of voice, though I was ashamed to find that it wavered with hurt. "Every time you open your goddamn mouth it's Troy this, Troy that. I have been _literally right here_ the entire summer, just waiting for you to see that while Troy may not be here, _I am_, and I wanted to just smack some sense into you but that wouldn't work because Troy could even do that better, now, couldn't he? So why don't you just go and _marry him!_" At that point, tears started streaming down my face, caused by a mixture of anger, hurt, and shame; which emotion was even prevalent in that moment I wasn't quite sure, but either way, in order to try and save face I quickly turned around, yanked my purse off the coat rack so hard it just about fell over, and marched out of the apartment and straight to my car, where I promptly threw the keys in and drove home with tears still running down my cheeks so that I wouldn't be able to be more hurt if Abed never came out to find me in my car, because that way I would never know if he had or hadn't tried.

* * *

Abed was worried for his sanity. He had always had a very vivid imagination, thus why he was able to envision scenarios so well in the dreamatorium. But he certainly had never thought it would become so vivid that he would be talking to himself from the darkest timeline. It was officially Freaking Him Out.

He had tried everything he could think of to try and drown out Evil Abed's voice, but nothing worked-not books, not television, not even singing in the shower. He had even resorted to asking Britta for counselling to see if she could help him get rid of his twisted doppelganger. He was reading the novelization of the _Chronicles of Riddick_ when Evil Abed made a play for his attention once again.

"Abed..."

Abed glared at the same page he had been re-reading for the past five minutes. "I'm not talking to you, because I'm not crazy."

Evil Abed smirked. "Think of it as inner dialogue."

"I'm reading the novelization of _Chronicles of Riddick_."

Evil Abed raised an eyebrow at that. "Can you honestly tell me that's a saner decision?" He shook his head. "You're worried you'll go crazy without Troy, especially now that you don't have Sophie to lean on. That's why you're gonna let Britta 'fix' you, right? Because you think you're _broken_, you're going to let someone diagnose you who said her favorite superhero was _X-Man?_"

Abed finally looked over at his goatee-wearing doppelganger. "I'm a little scared," he admitted. "Things are bad."

Evil Abed narrowed his eyes. "When the world gets bad enough, Abed, the good go crazy. But the _smart_," he said with a hint of a smirk, "they go bad." He shoved off of the doorframe of the dreamatorium where he had been leaning, taking a step back into the room, as though to draw Abed closer so that he could keep him in sight. "Come on in here. Let's talk about it."

Abed's brow furrowed in thought. "I think it's safer if I talk to Britta," he said, having weighed his options, even though his mind could see the logic in Evil Abed's words, especially from all the villains in movies that had once been good, but turned bad once they saw the reality of the world they lived in. And despite that he enjoyed the movies where the good guys won, he had to admit to himself that honestly, it would almost never work out that way with the enormous odds that they were almost always up against. He could see the logic in Evil Abed's words, and that scared him more than the fact that Evil Abed was even there to begin with. He really wished Britta would hurry up already.

"I think it's even safer if I talk to her first," Evil Abed said, causing Abed to turn and look at him. Evil Abed fixed him with a compelling stare. "Come on in here. Why don't you talk to _me _about how you've been lately?"

Abandoning his book, Abed took a couple cautious steps toward the dreamatorium, but then forced himself to stop. "Wait. How do I know this isn't a trick?"

Evil Abed gave him a 'really?' look. "You don't. But look at it this way, Abed," he said with a smirk. "I'm the only one who could ever understand how you feel. Not Britta. Not anyone else. Because I am you. You see, that's why Sophie left, because she couldn't understand what you're going through right now."

Abed looked down at his feet, and found himself taking another step towards the dreamatorium. He lifted his gaze to Evil Abed again. "But I know she cares about me. She just doesn't know how things affect me all the time."

Evil Abed gave a long-suffering sigh. "Look, Abed. I realize your lame point of view is very narrow-minded, but look at it this way: In my timeline, the darkest timeline, things aren't even as bleak as they look for you here. At least Troy's still around there. And you and Sophie are still together." He raised an eyebrow. "Do you get what I'm saying?"

Abed's brow furrowed. "You're saying that... if this timeline became more like the darkest timeline, then I would get Troy and Sophie back."

"Wow, Lame Abed's not as stupid as I thought!" Evil Abed said sarcastically, clapping. "Now, why don't you come on in here and we can discuss this revelation of yours some more..."

Abed's feet moved towards the dreamatorium, and finally crossed the threshold.

Evil Abed smirked. He had won.

* * *

Abed had reverted into what he thought his evil counterpart would be like. It was easy for him with his vivid imagination to immerse himself into the role of another 'character', to the extent where he was unsure whether he was actually Evil Abed, or whether he was still himself, but he had been taken over by Evil Abed. He wasn't exactly sure which it was, but he had determined that in order to be with Sophie and Troy again, he had to darken the timeline enough so that it was on par with the darkest timeline. And the 'easiest' way to darken the timeline would be to make it so Jeff had only one arm. With that thought in mind, he headed for where Britta had told him during his psychoanalysis of her that Jeff would be, in the 'court' room.

Frustratingly enough, when Abed got there, he plugged the bone saw in only to realize that the cord on it was _too short_.

_Seriously? _He thought, irked that he had come all this way only to be impeded by something that seemed so trivial. He had to find the janitor's storage closet and raid it for an extension cord. Not like the janitor would miss it... after all, they were pretty short-staffed, so they hardly got much cleaning done on a daily basis except for, according to rumor, the women's washrooms. (Not that he had any way of proving or disproving that theory, as last time he had tried to see for himself, Annie and Shirley had just about had heart attacks and made him promise to never try that again.)

Heading back into the 'court' room, Abed quickly hooked up the bone saw to the extension cord and plugged it in, pleased that his plan could finally be under way again. He stood up, turning towards Jeff, and started to step towards him, but the sound of Jeff's voice made him pause for a moment. It sounded like he was making a Classic Winger speech, and Abed could never manage to ignore one of those.

"The truth is... I'm lying when I say there is no truth," Jeff said. "The truth is... the pathetically... stupidly, inconveniently, obvious truth is... helping only ourselves is bad, and helping each other is good. Now, I just wanted to get out of here, pass biology, and be a lawyer again instead of helping Shirley. That was bad," he said, a bit sheepishly. Then he smirked. "And my former colleague wanted _so badly_ to keep his _rich client_ that he just asked me to roll over in exchange for my old job." He shrugged as the onlookers gasped, looking shocked. "So... I guess we all walked in here pretty bad. But now," he said, looking over at Shirley, "Shirley's gone good. Shirley's helping me. It's _that easy_. You just stop thinking about what's good for _you_, and start thinking about what's good for _someone else_."

As Jeff spoke those words, Abed's goatee fell off.

As Abed's felt goatee fell off of his face, he felt rationality returning to him, and promptly dropped the bone saw he was holding with a jolt, as though it had burned him. Ashamed that he had tried to turn his timeline into the darkest timeline because of the stress of both Troy and Sophie leaving him, he sighed and promptly left the room before any of the study group members realized he had been present at the 'court case', intending to go to the cafeteria and buy some sweets-maybe cookies-and apologize to Sophie for having been unable to communicate to Sophie that she was important to him when she had been feeling insecure about her place in his life due to the short time they had been dating before Troy had left.

When Abed sat down at the study group's usual table, he sighed, wondering if he should put his head down or not, but then remembered how many people touched this table and the fact that Greendale's cleaning staff was in pretty short supply, so the tables hardly ever got cleaned, and promptly decided against it.

"Mind if I sit with you?"

Despite the fact that the voice gave away who it was before he turned to look at them, he was surprised to turn his head and see Sophie standing next to him nonetheless.

"Speak of the devil," he said, then quickly corrected himself to make sure he hadn't unintentionally offended her. "Well, you're a lot nicer than the devil. Sorry. I was actually just thinking about going to see you. We should talk. I was going to bring you some cookies. Do you want me to go buy you one?" Realizing he was rambling, he quickly stood up to go buy her said cookies in order to get a moment to calm down and set his thoughts straight, but stopped when she grabbed his hand, wrapping it in both of hers.

"Abed," she said softly, causing him to turn and look at her. Her expression was apologetic and sad. "I'm sorry I said what I did. I was just feeling...frustrated and lonely. You seemed like you were more attached to Troy than you were to me, but that was no reason for me to act the way that I did. It only makes sense for you to be more attached to Troy because you've known him longer, and you're best friends, for heaven's sake. But I was jealous, and hurt, and I said things when I was angry that I know I shouldn't have." She took a deep, steadying breath and looked him in the eye. "I'm sorry. Can you please forgive me?"

Abed smiled. "Only if you'll forgive me. I didn't realize that was how you felt, and I was just making it worse by focusing completely on Troy rather than telling you how much it meant to me that you stuck with me through it all."

"So...all's forgiven?" she asked hopefully.

"I think we can call it even and say _no legacy is so rich as honesty_."

Sophie grinned. "_All's Well That Ends Well?_ Abed, I thought your thing was pop culture, not literature."

Abed shrugged. "Well, Shakespeare could've been considered pop culture back in the day, and besides, there's a lot of stuff I like that references it, so it's good to know it."

Sophie looked down at where she had both her hands wrapped around his one, and evened it out by grabbing his other hand. She looked up at him and smiled. "I'm glad we were able to work things out, Abed." With that, she leaned up to press her lips against his.

Someone whistled loudly.

"Shut up, Leonard!"

* * *

**A/N:** Thank you SO very much to everyone who has followed along this story, reviewed, and/or added this to their favorites/alerts! I have added a poll to my profile so go and vote on it and let me know if you would like to see a sequel after season four starts, if you'd like to see more one-shots, both, or neither.

Again, thank you for reading, and for your patience with this final chapter. I have yet to decide an updating schedule for my Oneirology 101 one-shots, but I've already written a couple more, so I'll probably update it once every one or two weeks, which should tide people who want a sequel over for now while I await season four's start. I'm not sure if I want to write a sequel yet; I want to wait and see what season four gives me to work with first.

Farewell, readers! May season four treat us all well!


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